1920-05-21

LETTER FROM HIS EXCELLENCY.

Mr. SPEAKER:: I have the honour to communicate a letter from His Excellency the Governor General signed by his own hand and which is as follows:
Gentlemen of the House of Commons:
I have received with great pleasure the Address that you have voted in reply to my speech at the opening of Parliament and thank you for it sincerely.
Government House, Ottawa, May 17, 1920.
Devonshire,



JOINT PRINTING COMMITTEE.

Mr. CURRIE moved:: That the recommendations in the first report of the Joint Committee on Printing he concurred In.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: This motion will require unanimous consent in the absence of notice.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Return of the number of persons employed in the Department of Indian Affairs; copy of a letter signed by 21 members and senators; return in regard to the publishers of the Montreal Gazette and of the amounts paid to them; return showing the number of persons employed in the Department of Labour.-Hon. Mr. Sifton.
Return showing the number of persons employed in the Department of Marine at Ottawa; copy of Order in Council No. 1061, dated 15th May, 1920, with regard to the payment of gratuities.-Hon. Mr. Ballan-tyne.

[Stage Direction]
Rt. Hon. Sir ROBERT BORDEN (Prime
Minister): I beg to move the motion of which I gave notice yesterday:
[Stage Direction]
That when this House adjourns on Friday, the 21st instant, it do stand adjourned until Tuesday, the 25th instant.
Edgar Nelson Rhodes: I must point out, as I
did yesterday, that this motion requires two days' notice and only one day s notice has been given. It can therefore only be ent rtained by unanimous consent.


Sir ROBERT BORDEN:: I do not know whether it is applicable or not, but my attention has been directed to the language of rule 40 which says that the rule requiring notice shall not apply to the times of meeting or adjournment of the House.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: I think the interpretation which has been given to the section under that rule is that it refers to the hour for meeting because in the French edition "heme" is used. That being so, as at present advised, I am still of the opinion that two days' notice would be required to be given.


Mr. GAUVREAU:: I do not want to be the only dissenting voice in this House to the motion moved by the right hon. the Prime Minister (Sir Robert Borden). \Ve have no hope or expectation of an increase in the indemnity this session although the high cost of living is just as bad for members of Parliament as for anybody else.


An hon. MEMBER:: Worse.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: The hon. gentleman-


Charles Arthur Gauvreau: I shall not make a speech.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: Perhaps the hon. gentleman will allow me to interrupt him to point out that if this motion is to be entertained by unanimous consent there can be no debate. I assume that the hon. gentleman, in the few remarks which he has already addressed to the House, intends to withdraw the objection that he made yesterday.


Charles Arthur Gauvreau: No, but I want to give the reason why I took objection to it. It is in deference to those who joined hands with this side of the House to make Ascension day a holiday. I hope that the Prime Minister will see his way clear to starting Saturday and morning sittings as soon as possible, and the sooner the better, because every member wants to get home to attend to his private affairs-if we want to live up to our obligations and make a decent living.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. J. E. ARMSTRONG:: I would like to ask the Government if it will be possible to print 25,000 copies of the speech of the hon. the Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton) for distribution among members. We have many requests from different parts of the country and it is impossible to get copies from the distribution office. I think that a copy of this speech should be in the hands of every person, or at 'least of every family, in Canada, and we ought to have at least a reasonable number for distribution.


Mr. LAPOINTE:: I would not have any objection provided that the answer by the hon. member for Shelburne and Queen's (Mr. Fielding) is also published and distributed.


Robert Laird Borden: We will take into consideration the suggestions which have been made. I think that arrangements are already under way to print a large number of copies of the resolutions.



THE BUDGET.


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Thursday, May 20, the debate on ,the motion of Sir Henry Drayton (Minister of Finance), that Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair for the House to go into Committee of Ways and Means and the proposed amendment thereto of Hon. W. S. Fielding.
Mr. A. B. MeCOIG (Kent, Ont.): Mr. Speaker, representing in this House, as I have the privilege of doing, one of the largest urban and rural ridings, if not the largest, in the Dominion of Canada, I wish to give to the House a few reasons why 1 purpose supporting the amendment of my hon. friend the member for Shelburne and Queen's (Mr. Fielding) to the Budget which was presented to the House a few days ago by the hon. the Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton). I wish as well to offer a few objections to some of the arguments which were advanced by hon. gentlemen who addressed the House from the Government side and to give a few reasons why I take exception to the views which they presented. Mr. Speaker, with your long parliamentary experience and knowledge of the different members

of this House personally you *would have been amused as you sat in your place and listened to the hon. member for Parkdale (Mr. Mowat) who spoke with a brief for the great Mas-sey-Harris corporation, advocating their case and telling us why we should not allow agricultural implements to come into Canada in opposition to theirs.
Edgar Nelson Rhodes: I have very great doubt as to whether the hon. gentleman is in order in imputing to another hon. gentleman the circumstance that he holds a brief for a manufacturing corporation. I have very grave doubt indeed as to whether the hon. gentleman would be in order in making an assertion of that kind unless he were to do so in a constitutional manner.


Mr. ROBB:: That expression, as I understand, is only used as a figure of speech.
Mr. MeCOIG: If it would be more in order that the word "brief" should be withdrawn I will withdraw it and say that he was advocating their case. With all due respect to that hon. gentleman, when he undertakes to interfere with any policy that may be advocated by any hon. gentleman in this House, which has for its object the admission of agricultural implements into this country in order to give us greater food supply, those who have the real cause of the plain people of this land at heart should object to the statement the hon. gentleman made, and should do their utmost to put an end to the great contribution that some manufacturers are securing from the people of Canada at the present time. In justification of this statement let me draw the attention of the House to a despatch in the Globe from the city of Washington which states that this year the wheat crop in the United States will be 483,000,000 bushels as against a crop of 731,000,000 bushels last year. This shows that we are going to be confronted with a great shortage of wheat on the part of the United States. We have an Associated Press despatch fro-m old England which states that the British people will receive fro-m the North American continent 4,000,000 tons less wheat than they received last year. I also want to draw the attention of Parliament and the country to the fact that we are face to face with scarcity, it may not be too much to say that we are possibly on the threshold of a wheat famine. This Parliament should do everything possible to assist the producers of this land in getting every bushel of grain so that they may reap as large a 167
harvest as possible to assist the other nations of the world with what we do not need for home consumption.
Let me go further, Sir. We have the hon. member for Parkdale (Mr. Mowat) standing up and advocating protection to-day because he represents- in this House one of the large cities in the province of Ontario. But it was only a few years ago, in 191-1, that the same hon. gentleman was running in a rural riding on the reciprocity platform and advocating the very thing which he seems to be opposing to-day. May we not therefore say: "Oh, consistency thou art a jewel"? At a late hour last night we heard the hon. member -for Fraser Valley (Mr. Stacey). How he tickled the ears of the high protectionists, and the representatives of the corporations, or rather the stockholders of the corporations-I should rather put it in that form. How they applauded and pounded their desks when the hon. member complimented the Government because they had placed a duty of ninety cents a barrel on apples-a food, Sir, which the people require so badly and which in the old days so many families in humble circumstances could enjoy. The effect of this duty on apples was brought home to me in a convincing form last night when in company with -another gentleman I took a walk down Sparks street. Then I understood the reason for the applause with which the remarks of the hon. member for Fraser Valley were greeted. My friend and I dropped into a fruit store and what did we see there? A sign that apples were selling at the rate of three for 25 cents. Fancy, Sir, three apples for a quarter, and hon. gentlemen opposite were pounding their desks because of the fact that the apple growers were getting a protection of ninety cents a barrel! Fancy people in humble circumstances being forced to pay such a price for fruit which they so greatly need, instead of being able to obtain it at a reasonable figure. I am interested in fruit-growing to a limited extent. I set out some fruit trees in my orchard last year, and propose to do the same again this year; but I say, Sir, that if the customs duty compels the plain people of Canada to pay so much for fruit let that duty be removed in order that fruit-which after all is a food-may be available to them at the very lowest possible cost.
We had also yesterday a lengthy address from the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens). We listened to him for an hour before dinner and then for another hour when the House resumed after recess. The hon. member attacked the United Farm-



ers, and what did he say? He said to them: " You people have stores in the West. You supply agricultural implements to purchasers out there and demand the cash." Then the hon. member grew eloquent and he addressed compliments to the hon. member for Brantford (Mr. Cockshutt), whose face lighted up at the compliments that were paid to him. The hon. member for Brantford was held up as a public benefactor who supplied the farmer of the West with his wares and granted him six months, two years, and sometimes three years, to pay for them. Is it not a grand thing that we should have in this House a manufacturer who is so generous that he is willing to sell the machinery which he produces on lengthy payments? But did the hon. member for Vancouver Centre state that the hon. member for Brantford's firm-the International Harvester Company-and also the Massey-Harris Company, when they sell machinery to the farmers in the West or in other parts of the country, expect those farmers to pay at the rate of from eight to twelve per cent per annum for every day they give them on the goods which they supply. Furthermore, Sir, on some occasions, on some of the implements these firms supply, when the customer wants time, they advance the price from $50 to $75, and add interest to the price besides. Is it not significant that these gentlemen are united together and are all agreed upon the one great question of extracting from the people of this country every possible dollar they can, and likewise charging them for the time allowed in paying for the goods?
The hon. member for Vancouver Centre brought forward one question which is of vital importance to the people, and on which I agree with him to a very large extent, and that is the question of the Wheat Board. That hoard, I wish to assure the Government, does not meet with the approval of the farmers in that section of Ontario which I have the privilege of representing, and for reasons which I will furnish later. In the meantime let me say that the hon. member for Vancouver Centre certainly did pay his compliments to the United Farmers in this regard. He almost charged them with responsibility for the creation of the Wheat Board, but he omitted to state that it was the Government, and not the United Farmers that created the W'heat Board. Some time ago, in reply to a question, the Minister of Trade and Commerce stated that the participation certificates would likely yield the wheat growers about forty cents a 
bushel. The Wheat Board in the first place exacted on every bushel of wheat that is sold in this country fifteen cents, in the second place twenty-five cents, and in the third instance forty cents, making a total of eighty cents. Thus, if the eighty cents a bushel is received on the wheat, and the participation certificates only amount to forty cents in the way of return to the producer, it is going to cost the Canadian farmer forty cents for every bushel of wheat that has been handled and sold by the Wheat Board in Canada. If this is true, then figuring on the basis of five bushels of wheat to every barrel of flour, if the consumers of Canada had got their wheat at what the farmers sold it for they would have been able to purchase their flour at $2 a barrel less than they have had to pay for it. This, Sir, I believe, is one of the reasons the people of Canada are opposed to the Wheat Board, and why they are to a very large extent agreed that it should be wiped out of existence at the earliest possible moment.
Let me go a step further in this matter. As far as regards the province of Ontario, the Wheat Board have been taking the wheat from that province and not allowing the millers to grind it, which has resulted in driving many of the stock raisers of Ontario out of the stock-raising business. Those stock raisers would have been able to obtain the offal from the wheat had the millers of Ontario only been allowed to operate and been permitted to sell the flour they could have made instead of shipping away the wheat to be ground in other countries. What does that mean? It means, Sir, that in the province of Ontario for months at a time, the wheels of the flour mills including many of the largest, have not been turning; in the different localities many men have been deprived of employment; and the stock raisers have been driven out of business to an extent that will be illustrated by some figures which I shall now quote.
These figures are taken from the stockyards report as set forth in the Toronto Globe, and they relate to stock that was placed in the Toronto stockyards for the first three months of the present year, and the corresponding months of last year. Of cattle there were 72,766 head in 1920. In the corresponding three months of last year there were 90,183 head, making a difference of nearly 18,000 less cattle sold in those stockyards this year than was the case in 1919. Of swine there w'ere 95,285 for the first three months of the present

year, and 139,969 for the corresponding period of last year, a difference of nearly 45,000 hogs. I ask you, what will that mean to the consumers of this country? Of sheep there were 14,083 this year, and 26,764 last year, a difference of 12,000 less sheep in the first three- months of the present year. What does that mean, Sir? It means that on account of the wheat being shipped from this country instead of being ground here, stock raisers have been deprived of the offal to enable them to finish their stock and place it on the markets of Canada.
Now let me give figures to further show the extent to which these men are going out of the stock-raising business. Taking calves, there were 2,500 more calves sold in Toronto for the first three months this year than were sold for the corresponding period last year; whereas if the farmers of Ontario had the offal and had the feed which they should have been able to obtain they would have been able to finish a large proportion af these calves, and in placing them on the market been able to contribute materially to the available food supply of the country. I therefore feel on safe ground in advising the Government to hesitate before they permit	the Wheat
Board to remain any longer in charge of the supplies which are being produced by	the farmers	of Canada.
Objection to the Wheat Board has been directed, so far as supporters of the Government are concerned, not only by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens), who has looked thoroughly into the question. We see that the representative of the Government to England and also to Washington, in the person of Mr. Lloyd Harris, is also attacking the board. At a dinner given in Hamilton the other day that gentleman is reported as follows:
Mr. Harris alluded to the Board of Commerce being appointed to check profiteering, and stated that whi-le it was at this duty, the Wheat Board was profiteering to " beat the band." If he were allowed to control the entire steel output of Canada he could make all kinds of money, and the situation regarding wheat was like this. The board made wheat prices that were a crime.
Now, Sir, if the trade representative of the Government to England says that the Wheat Board is profiteering to beat the band and that the prices they made for wheat are a crime, then am I not justified in appealing to the Government to give the matter a great deal more serious consideration than they have evidenced up to the present time? The statement is also made that the Board of Commerce is at present 167$
investigating the operations of the profiteers of the country. In this connection I would recall to the House the day the Board of Commerce was created. You will remember, Sir, that hon. members on this side of the House protested against the creation of the Board of Commerce, advancing the argument that we had too many commissions at the expense of the people of Canada. We protested against the Board of Commerce on the ground that we ought to have a public prosecutor in the country whose duty it would be to investigate all cases of profiteering andi to bring before the county judges all persons against whom charges could be made. We contended that profiteers could be prosecuted in that manner with less expense to the people of Canada. That was our stand then, so far as I am concerned, I can say that it is my attitude yet in regard to this subject. The Department of Finance now have offenders in connection with the Income Tax or	the Business Profits Tax
brought	before the	county courts
through the medium of their officers, thus obviating a great deal of unnecessary expenditure, and there is no reason why a similar procedure should not be followed in the case of profiteers. The Board of Commerce, Mr. Speaker, has issued a new circular which it would take too long a time for me to read. This circular is issued to every grocer of the country, and in warm weather like this I am afraid it will prove too laborious a task for the already hard-worked man behind the counter to read what is contained in it. There is a long list of requirements as to what these people shall and shall not do, what they pay for their goods, what they sell them for, what profits they receive, and all information as to whether they are profiteering or not. It is quite a voluminous document. Could you imagine a more ridculous letter sent out to the trade, Sir? Here is a list of articles, eighty in number, which has to be made out every month. Why, Sir, are the Government going to let this board run wild? Are they going to allow the board to inconvenience beyond all reason people who are transacting business honestly, requiring them to have special clerks to keep track of every article taken in and sold and every cent of profit which is made? If eo, the expense of additional clerks which will have to be borne by the consumer will greatly enhance the price of goods. Thl* body has been in existence for nearly a year investigating profiteering, but it has not yet succeeded in putting one profiteer in jail;


Mr. McCOIG:: Has the hon. member any reason to say that it has not?


Mr. HOCKEN:: Yes, I have.


Archibald Blake McCoig: I would like to have your proof.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: Order. The hon. gentleman (Mr. Hocken) would not be in order in speaking at this stage.


Archibald Blake McCoig: I do not know why the hon. member should dispute it. The state-

ment appears in the editorial column of one of the most reputable newspapers of Canada, published in the city from which my hon. friend (Mr. Hocken) comes.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Read it again.
Mr. MoGOIG: I will send the clipping over to my hon. friend.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: The British Governmnet has not acted.
Mr. MeCOIG: I will read it again, in case the hon. member wants to copy it in the Orange Sentinel next week: [DOT]>
A real shell exploded last week with the announcement that the committee not only thinks-


An hon. MEMBER:: "The Committee?"
Mr. MeCOIG: A committee of the House of Commons appointed to investigate this matter.


John Allister Currie: No, a committee of the Treasury officials.
Mr. MeCOIG: Does the hon. member (Mr. Hocken) wish me to read the article?


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Surely.
Mr. MeCOIG: It continues:
-not only thinks the proposal practicable, but has devised a plan whereby $2,750,000,000 can be collected from 75,000 war profiteers.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Has that been adopted by the British Government?
Mr. MeCOIG: Well, the hon. member will realize that I have not all the details, but it is quite evident that it has, because reputable newspapers all over the country have referred to it.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.
Mr. MeCOIG: Then I put this question to the hon. member: Is he opposed to extracting from the war profiteers some of the profits that they made?


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: 
John Allister Currie: I think the hon. member knows he is wrong now.
Mr. MeCOIG: If the hon. member for Toronto West (Mr. Hocken) is satisfied

with saying-and I saw him shake his head -that he is not in favour of collecting from the war-time profiteers-


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I did not say that.
Mr. MeCOIG: Well, if he is in favour of collecting from the war-time profiteers, let him join with us on this side of the House in demanding that the Government impose a tax on these war-time profiteers and thus increase the revenues of this country.
These are, to a very large extent, the reasons why I am on this occasion assuring the hon. member for Shelburne and Queen's (Mr. Fielding) that I will support his amendment and any other amendment brought in by any hon. member for the purpose of assisting in reducing the tariff on the necessaries of life, so as to give us every opportunity of producing as much as possible with a view to making the cost of living in this country as cheap as possible to the Canadian consumers.
Mr. JOHN A. MAHARG (Maple Creek): Mr. Speaker, before entering into a discussion of the Budget, I should like to congratulate the Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton) on his frankness in laying before Parliament and the people of Canada the exact situation in which we find ourselves from a financial point of view. I should also like to congratulate him on what appears to me to be a brave attempt in some respects to secure additional revenue. I cannot go so far as to congratulate him on all of the methods he proposes in order to secure this revenue; I only wish I could. No doubt, he is making an honest attempt to curtail extravagant expenditure; but as the hon. member for Kent (Mr. McCoig) has said, the relief he hopes to give to some and his belief that those more able to pay will be called upon to do so, will, I am afraid fall far short of the mark. His estimates of values of goods when they become luxuries or not real necessities, might apply to warmer climates; but they are, in the main, rather too low for a country with the temperatures we have. They may, however, be, in his opinion, the right values to put on these goods, and we shall leave the matter at that. He might have gone just a little further, and while he purposes making those pay who are able to do so, he might have made it a little easier for those to whom he wishes to afford relief to get along. His Budget makes no provision for lowering the daily or monthly cost of living of the average workingman, the average individual, be he a labourer

in town or a labourer on the farms. This Budget will not make any reduction in the monthly bills of such a man; on the contrary, I believe it will increase them to a certain extent, and I do not think that is what the minister purposed doing. He might have gone a little further and substantially reduced, if not entirely wiped out the tariff on the necessaries of life, particularly as regards foodstuffs. We, as producers of food, which is practically our entire production, are quite prepared to give the consumer the entire world for his market in which to buy his necessaries of life so far as food is concerned. The Minister of Finance might also have gone a little further and made some reductions in the tariff on other necessaries of life. Taking into consideration the climatic conditions he might have made it easier for a man to keep his family warm during the long winter months we 'have in this country. I will not dwell on this matter any further than to draw attention to the fact that the Budget of the Minister of Finance is not going to accomplish what I think he intends it should do.
Another point that I wish to touch on, apart from the Budget entirely, is this, namely, that the discussion that has taken place and the sources that it has come from in this House must surely furnish food for thought for the average individual in 'Canada. We have heard the statement made that political expediency has largely governed the actions of Government as well as of individuals in this country; and when we see men who in former years were ardent supporters of tariff reductions taking, as the hon. member for Kent (Mr. McCoig) has just stated, a complete somersault and now advocating protection, there must be something worthy of consideration at the bottom of the matter. We have often heard it stated that a certain number of Liberals remain within the Liberal party in order that they may control that party. I am not going to say whether that is true or not. The year 1911 brough a number of that type of Liberals to the front and their position became clear, and I hope 1920 will bring the balance, if there are any, to the front, so that the people of Canada may know exactly where-they stand. Such disclosures are being made from time to time, and the position of a number of such Liberals has been disclosed. There may be obvious reasons for this. We hear of large mergers taking place these days and of certain concerns represented by certain hon. gentlemen being interested in those mergers, and there may be something in that.
We shall, however, leave the matter at that, and no doubt time will disclose just to what extent that condition of affairs exists.
1 desire to touch briefly on the remarks of one or two hon. members who have taken part in this debate. In the first place, I want to deal briefly with a few oif the remarks made by the hon. member for Fort William and Rainy River (Mr. Man-ion) who, I am glad, is in his seat, although I can assure him I am not going to say anything that will be annoying to him. While addressing the House my hon. friend gave us a large number of comparisons of conditions, his remarks and his comparisons being almost entirely as regards the Mother Country, Germany and the United States. He held Germany and the United States up as models, England on the other hand being in every case at the bottom. He gave us figures and percentages without end, but his figures and percentages amount to absolutely nothing unless the full conditions are understood. He first dealt with the wheat production and importation of Great Britain in an endeavour to show that Great Britain did not compare with other European countries, of which he mentioned several, in the matter of production of wheat. He stated, if I understood him aright, that during the year previous to the war Great Britain imported 215,009,000 bushels of wheat and produced 57,000,000 bushels, making a total of 272,000,000 bushels. The House will readily see that Great Britain did not import all that wheat for her own consumption; otherwise, she would have been consuming per capita almost double as much wheat as any other country in the world. Canada is considered one of the largest consumers of wheat, and our consumption is in the neighbourhood of five bushels per capita. What did Great Britain do with that wheat? I want to tell the hon. gentleman that he has no doubt eaten some of that wheat [DOT] that was imported into the Old Country, ground into flour, made into biscuits, and sold to him in his own city at a price equal to, if not less than, the .Canadian-made article. That is one of Great Britain's ways of doing business. She thrives on this importation and exportation, and it is that which has made het what she is. I just give that illustration to show that unless you have all the figures and understand fully the conditions, such a huge array of percentages and figures as the hon. member gave count for nothing.
I might go a little further. The hon. gentleman-and I am very sorry he made thi3 comparison-endeavoured to hold Great

Britain up as a land almost of paupers. He mentioned the thousands and thousands of paupers there -were in that country, and in his comparison he took the year 1914 for England and the year 1910 for the United States. Now we all recollect very well what hardships there were in our own country in 1914, and how in 1910 this country was flourishing as it had not done before for years. But in 1912 and 1913, which is about the period the hon. ' gentleman took for England, we find that in our own country municipalities and provinces were furnishing funds to give employment. I know of hundreds of thousands of tons of rock being crushed, even though it could not be used at the time, but was merely piled up, in order to give employment to our people. I think the hon. gentleman should have taken these conditions into consideration in making his comparison.


Mr. MANION:: I explained when I gave those figures that the reason I took 1910 for the United 'States was that I could get no figures for 1914 for that country.


Mr. MAHABG:: But the hon. gentleman said that it did not make any difference anyway, comparing 1910 in the United States with 1914 in Great Britain.


Robert James Manion: I do not think it would make very much difference.


John Archibald Maharg: There are paupers and paupers, and some countries do not worry very much about them until the paupers are amongst them, in the curb or some other similar place, when institutions have to !be provided for them. Other countries let people shift for themselves and keep no records of their paupers. This should be borne in mind when studying the hon. gentleman's comparison.
The hon. gentleman also compared the railways of England with those of other countries, [DOT] and here again, unless the actual conditions are understood, figures and percentages count for nothing. He instanced the capitalization per mile of railroads in England. Probably the hon. gentleman has travelled more miles in England than I have, and he must have observed that there is absolutely no>
comparison between the roadbed 'and facilities along the railroads in England, which he tried to show up in their worst light, and those in the United States or Canada. The roadbed of the railroads in England and the speed at which the trains go is absolutely different from the conditions that prevail in this country. Were the light trains that are used on the roads in England hurled across our roads
[Mr. Maharg.l
at the speed at which they go there, they would be in the ditch before they had got up speed. He must also remember that it is service that counts. To give only one illustration, the roads running into the city of London bring in almost as many people to work each day as there are in the city itself. Millions of people are brought in to the city in the morning to work, and are taken out in the evening. The roads there are built for service and they give service, and where you get service, rates are a secondary consideration. The hon. gentleman also gave the cost per ton mile. Here again his comparison was entirely misleading, unless you are familiar with the conditions. Let me give just one illustration: Previous to the war it cost more to take a bushel or a carload of wheat across the province of Saskatchewan toy short haul, similar to what they have in England, than it took to transport it from the province of Saskatchewan to the port of Liverpool. That shows that it is the length of haul that counts, and not the circumstances as the hon. gentleman gave them.


John Allister Currie: Is not the high cost of
hauling a bushel or a carload of wheat across the Prairie Provinces due to the arrangement made by the Government- with some of the provinces for a fixed price between Fort William and Winnipeg?
Mr. iMAHARG: I presume the hon gentleman refers to the deal that the province of Manitoba made with one of the American lines. He will remember that that applied only to a portion of Manitoba, and also that this Parliament abrogated the agreement some two sessions ago. That agreement is not now in existence, if I understand the legislation that was passed, so it has no effect whatever on the rate for the short haul within the provinces, or on the long haul from any point in Saskatchewan either to Fort William or to Liverpool.
I think it would have been only fair if the hon. gentleman had made a few comparisons with what England had done after the war started. His comparisons related to the period previous to the war for the most part, and he made no comparisons with what England did after the war started, when the great morale which the hon. gentleman has spoken of in these protected countries was put to a very severe test. What do we find Great Britain did after the war started? The very first thing she did was to send over to the continent her "Contemptible Little Army"-as described by a German officer-of 300,000 men, which held back the Germans for days and

weeks and months. It was only
4 p.m. a short time afterwards, that free-trade Britain was financing these high-tariff countries which the hon. gentleman referred to the other day. Great Britain kept on financing them out of her own resources, and loaned money to them to a far greater amount than her borrowings from the United States. Great Britain did more than that. She broke the back of Germany while that other country which the hon. gentleman used in his comparison stood looking on, almost to the finish. It reminds me of a little incident I happened to witness once in a home. A mouse had made its appearance in the kitchen, where a little girl of tender years and her father happened to be at the time. While the father undertook to catch the mouse the little girl safely perched herself on a chair, and after he had succeeded in catching and killing the mouse, the little girl at once called to her mother upstairs "we have got the mouse." That was very much the position that country which he was comparing to England was in at the close of the war. What is England doing to-day? England today is paying the freight on the food that the United States has been good enough to sell to the people in Europe to keep them from starving. I do not think we need to go much farther-


Mr MICHAEL CLARK:: The loyal party.


John Archibald Maharg: We could give comparison after comparison with the little free trade country that was held up and which came out of the bottom of the list but which holds a. very prominent position no matter in what respect you may wish to compare it. The hon. gentleman made comparisons as to the advancement of agriculture in Great Britain. What has Great Britain had to do since she adopted the free trade policy? She has had to break down and she has broken down to a certain extent, the greatest land monopoly that any country ever had to contend with. First of all she had to ' break down the system and get possession of the land. What did she do in connection with Ireland? She spends hundreds of millions of pounds for the purchase of land on behalf of the agriculturists of Ireland. England had to break down this isystem before she could start building up again. Great Britain is not recognized as a producer of cereals. She is a land of pasturage; it does not pay her to produce cereals and she only turned to the production of cereals owing to the necessities of [DOT]war, and no country, not even Canada or
the United States, has increased its production of food stuffs to a greater extent than did Great Britain during the years of the war. I do not think we need go any farther. It was not because she could not do it but because there were better lines of business for her to follow.
I do not wish to take up too much of the time of the House but there were one or *two remarks of some other hon. gentlemen that I wish to refer to. The hon. gentleman who has just preceded me (Mr. Mc-Coig) has relieved me of considerable trouble in this respect, but he did not go quite far enough in some lines. The hon. member for Centre Vancouver (Mr. Stevens) yesterday gave us very largely a repetition-of what we got at our last regular session in regard to the farmers' movement. That was answered pretty fully, I think, at that [DOT]time, and I am not going to detain the House with a repetition of what was said then. Once is surely enough. But he made further some statements that are not correct and which I intend to deal with. The hon. gentleman who has preceded me touched on one of these and that is the Wheat Board. We did not ask for the Wheat Board. The inference, if not the statement is to the effect that the farmers asked for the Wheat Board. One hon. member described it as the pooling of our wheat. While the hon. member from Kent (Mr. MeCoig) stated that the Government appointed the Wheat Board I want to go further and say that the Government did it against the strong opposition of the farmers [DOT]of this country. The farmers did not want it and they did not ask for it. But if the Government stepped in, took possession and broke down the lines which had been built up financially and otherwise, and if there is pooling in the buying of wheat overseas, we have no hesitation in saying that we consider it the proper course for our Government to carry out pooling in the selling of wheat, just so long at least as there was pooling in buying from us. We know where this comes from, we know whom the hon. gentleman from Vancouver Centre is speaking for. He is speaking for those who want to get back to the old speculative methods of dealing in wheat. We know who they are and to what lengths the ramifications of their influence extend. They have secured possession of a portion of the press of Western Canada, they have got their tentacles into almost every branch of western business. Behind this movement is a most powerful company, and what has been said by this hon. gentleman

is only an echo of the editorials appearing in the press controlled by them, and it is about time the people of this country knew why this campaign was being carried on and why the hon. gentleman is knocking the farmers' movement. It is simply to make it possible for the speculators to get back into action and to mulct the consumers as well as the producers in connection with the marketing of grain. The present system is in the interest not only of the producer but of the consumer. Just so long as the pooling arrangement exists on the other side where our wheat is marketed, we must have a similar arrangement here; if governments are going to [DOT]buy the governments will have to sell.
There was one other remark that was made yesterday to which I wish t-o refer. An hon. gentleman undertook to castigate the farmers rather severely and to say that they were dealing in American implements only. He is right to a certain extent. There is no doubt that they are dealing in American implements very largely, but there is a reason for it. Twelve or fourteen years ago we organized a 'company-not the company that was spoken of here yesterday but a local company- to handle necessaries in connection with our farms such as implements and so on, but not necessarily retail shelf goods. We organized and incorporated that company, but what did we find? We found that there was not a Canadian manufacturer who would sell us one agricultural implement of any kind. You could not even buy a hand cultivator. We had to go to the United States. We had to go as far south as Tennessee to buy a plough. And what did we find? We found that we could buy a three-furrow (plough, pay freight and duty into our country and sell that plough at less than we had been paying for a two-furrow plough. That is the exact situation. If any gentleman wants to blame us for that, well and good; we are quite prepared to justify our action in doing what we did. We were the victims of circumstances, we had to do it and we did it. The manufacturers say that we must have a tariff to raise revenue. If that is a fact, how are you going to get your revenue if you do not go outside and buy a few of the articles that you require? It is absolutely inconsistent, because if you have to get a revenue in that way you have to import. However, that was not the reason in this case; we went out of the country simply because the manufacturers in this country absolutely refused to sell to us.

I cannot agree with the Budget now before the House in many respects. In some respects I believe it is along the right line but it does not go far enough to meet the conditions of the country at the present time. I hope the minister may see fit during the consideration of the resolutions in committee to make some changes. I have 6poken to him about some changes that he agrees with me would be only fair and when the resolutions come into committee we will look into these matters. I am not going to touch upon them at this particular time as I have the assurance of the minister that if there is any unfairness it will be dealt with, and I am quite prepared to take the minister at his word.
As to the feeling in the country towards the Budget I have been travelling a little recently; I have been in some of the Ontario centres within the last day or two; and have been talking to a lot of people. They were not farmers, they were business and professional men, following different professions, some were labour men. I asked them for no information whatever; it was all volunteered to me. Both the professional man and the labouring man informed me that this Budget afforded no relief to them, not even to the labouring. man, but that it was going to make it harder for them. I hope the minister will take into consideration the values that he has placed on some of these articles when we are in committee. I think that the minister's valuation is too low on some things. I do not care how hard he hits some articles that are really luxuries, and that are not indispensable to the community; but with respect to wearing apparel, boots and shoes, and similar articles, I am convinced that it is not economical buying at the present time to purchase below the figures which the minister has named.


Mr. J. H. SINCLAIR (Antigonish and Guysborough):: Mr. Speaker, there appears to be no response from hon. gentleman opposite; therefore we on this side will continue the debate, as the last word on this question has not yet been uttered. I listened with much interest on Tuesday last to the speech of the Minister of Finance dealing with the condition of the country and the financial proposals of the Government. In commencing my remarks I wish to congratulate the minister on his decision to stop borrowing and in future to pay bis way. The financial methods in vogue in this country during the last four

or five years, by which the public debt has been rolling up like a snowball, were a matter of grave concern to every man who cared about the future of the country. The task of my hon. friend at this period of our history is not an easy one. In addition to providing for the war debt, it falls to his lot to teach the rudiments of economy to an Administration that has always been accustomed to "dash away and spend the money." This habit of extravagance they contracted before my hon. friend became a member of the ministry. We on this side sympathize with the minister in the position in which he is placed, and would like to help him if wti could. It must be a very uncomfortable experience to be seated on an empty chest by the side of bottomless deficits fishing for a Budget. The Government professes to stand for economy in theory, why not also stand for economy in practice? In the remarks that I am about to make regarding the expenditures of the Government it may appear as though 1 were attacking the Administration. This is not my purpose. My main object is to give my humble contribution in the direction of checking the prevailing extravagance and preventing waste. The real friends of the Government are the men who tell them the truth; the worst enemies they have are the people who flatter them. I see no good reason why this Government should be immune from criticisms. It is far from pei-fect. The President of the Privy Council (Mr. Rowell)-who comes nearer to being a saint than any of the rest of the ministers - does not claim perfection.


Mr. McMASTER:: Pretty nearly, though.


John Howard Sinclair: unknown quantity. The electorate requires a guide, a policy, an association with those who invite its confidence; and the Government offers neither guidance nor principles, nor familiarity with the people. The situation is not suddenly precipitated. It began with the conclusion of the war, since when futile efforts at permanent coalition have more than once been made, and minister after minister has dropped out with no successor to his place, until the situation has become difficult for the Government and despondent to its supporters.
Now, Sir, we have here a picture of a chicken with its head off, gasping and winking its eye to make believe it is still alive. That is an extraordinary picture to come from a friendly newspaper which had a great deal to do with bringing this Union Government into existence. The Gazette tells us that this is a leaderless ministry destitute of policy and the despair of its friends. That is strong language, hut no one in Canada is in a better position to know the facts than the Montreal Gazette. Other newspapers have been even more emphatic than the Gazette, but the Government pay no attention. I have in my desk a very interesting little book which I found in the library. The title is, "Recreations of an Historian." It was written by George M. Trevallyan. He describes an after dinner discussion in London many years ago participated in by a number of eminent literary men, of whom Thomas Carlyle was one. The question was whether protests in the press and in books have any effect on public conduct. These philosophers decided among themselves that these public protests and criticisms had no effect whatever. They simply read them and then threw them into some thirty-two-dollar waste-paper basket and forget all about them. Carlyle who' had been silent up to that moment, took his pipe out of his mouth and made the following remark:
There was a man once named Rousseau who wrote a hook on political questions. The nobles of that country laughed, but the next edition was bound in their skins.
It occurred to me that something like that, in a figurative sense might happen to the present Government. Now, Sir, the people have been asked to produce and save and many of them are honestly trying to do so. But what About the Government? War expenditure is inevitable, but what excuse can there be for increasing the ordinary expenditures of the Government by over $100,000,000 during the past year? Can there be any excuse for that enormous addition to our public expenditure? Now here are the figures. My hon. friend the Minister of Finance at page 2661 of Hansard the other day told us that the expenditure on ordin-

ary account for the year ending March 31, 1920, was 1336,741,110. Not one dollar of this is for war. When we turn to Public Accounts, page 9, for last year's expenditures, that is, for the year ending 31st March, 1919, we find the expenditure on ordinary account to be $232,731,282. Subtract the one from the other and you have an addition to our expenditure for the past year over the former year of $104,009,828. When the Minister of Immigration and Colonization (Mr. Calder) last year told us that any further cash advance to the soldiers would bankrupt the country, every one expected that the knife would be applied. But, Mr. Speaker, economy seems to be a despised and forgotten thing so far as this Administration is concerned. I have read to you a quotation from the Gazette. Now I want to call another friendly witness. The hon. member for Colchester (Mr. McCurdy) in his New Year's message to the people of Nova Scotia used the following language :
Whether rightly or wrongly, there exists a widespread opinion that due care is not exercised in Government expenditure. The feeling is daily growing stronger that the Government expenditure should be cut down and that the public estimates should be scrutinized and revised with a firmness never before exercised.
I submit that the hon. member for Colchester is right; expenditures must be cut down if we are to remain solvent, and in many cases they should be cut not with a blue pencil but with an axe. I submit, Sir, that up to this date there has been no sincere attempt on the part of the Government to carry out the views of my hon. friend the member for Colchester. You will find proof of this if you refer to the Estimates of the present year. Let me cite you one or two examples. The Government are proposing to vote for the Canadian Press, Limited, the sum of $50,000, and for the Canadian Associated Press $20,000, in all $70,000. I am opposed, Sir, to subsidizing the newspapers; I regard it as a vicious policy. The moment you begin to subsidize newspapers you strike a blow at their independence. There is the same objection to subsidizing the press as there is to subsidizing the church; both should be absolutely free. We are told that a similar amount will be contributed by the British Government. If that is so, Mr. Speaker, let me say distinctly that it is humiliating not only to the press of Canada but to the people as well to have the British taxpayers called upon to contribute money to the Canadian newspapers. Hon. gentlemen opposite say that Canada is a nation. Well, if so, let us act with becoming

dignity, and let the Canadian press deal with this matter as a business venture. What does my hon. friend the President of the Privy Council (Mr. Rowell) expect to get for this $70,000 of the people's money? I have no doubt that he expects to get $70,000 worth of propaganda. His plan is to teach the toddling public in Canada what they are to think about Imperial matters. Now, Sir, what is propaganda? I am not sure that I can give you a definition, but to speak frankly, my idea is that in a general way propaganda is tainted news, and the less we have of it the better. Sir, one grain of truth is worth a ton of propaganda. If, on the other hand, the object of the President of the Council is to strengthen the tie that binds us to the Old Country, then I say it is unnecessary. Those ties are already strong and they had better be left alone, we do not make them any stronger by talking about them. This constant chatter about loyalty to the Old Land and the old flag becomes tiresome and reminds me of Mark Twain's domestic hero, who boasted that he never jumped on his mother. Then we have such items in the Estimates as the following: Trent Valley Canal, $400,000; Toronto Harbour and Toronto Breakwater, $1,900,000; Canadian representation at Washington, $80,000; and scores of others. Now, these expenditures may be popular in the localities interested, and with an overflowing revenue there might be some justification for them; but no Canadian business would suffer if they were delayed for some time to come. Then again, we are asked to vote $150,000 for salaries and expenses of the Board of Commerce. I put it to you, .Sir: Is this a useful expenditure? Is this Board of Commerce worth $150,000 of the Canadian people's money? If it is not worth the money then let us dismiss the board and save that sum. Interest on war debt must be paid; our obligations to our soldiers and the dependents of the soldiers must be discharged ; but who will say that the Trent Valley Canal must now be built or that a playground must immediately be provided for the good people of Toronto? The taxpayers of the country are always willing to back up any productive enterprise, but they are not anxious to go to the poorhouse in .order to serve sectional interests. The people do not realize how their money is being spent. A gentleman talking to me the other day about this very point, said that if the Canadian taxpayer could come to Ottawa and see for himself how his money was being spent he would take an apoplectic fit. Now, Sir, I want to give a. few more
striking items. Here are one or two: Classification of the Civil Service, $108,173 57; New York News Agency, $30,000; one-half expense of Royal Commission relating to Indian Lands in British Columbia $317,797.68.


Mr. CAHILL:: And no settlement.


John Howard Sinclair: My hon. friend
is quite correct. The whole proceedings were practically useless. Expense of Canadian Trade Mission to England-this was nothing more or less than a free gift to the Manufacturers' Association - $123,410.36. And if you turn to page 646 of Hansard you will find an item of $24,194,639.78 for Canada's Merchant Marine. This amount was spent between April 1, 1919, and March 1, 1920, eight or nine months after the war ended. No tenders were called for; contracts were given out to friends of the Government at a very high price,-straight Government patronage to friends and supporters. Or turn to page 1158, where reference is made to a payment of $60,775.38 to the Gazette newpaper company of Montreal, and $25,373.69 to La Patrie newspaper company, also of Montreal, at the very time when five hundred employees were doing nothing in the Printing Bureau at Ottawa,- employees who are now being dismissed because, I understand, there is nothing for them to do.
The Government are constantly devising new methods for spending money. My hon. friend, the President of the Council (Mr. Rowell), is an adept at this kind of invention. I believe that this is the first Government in the history of the world that has had the temerity to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars of the people's money for the purpose of publishing flattering notices about themselves.


Andrew Ross McMaster: Shame.


John Howard Sinclair: The Department
of Public Information was organized for political purposes and for no other purpose. The President of the Council gave it a high-sounding name, but that deceived nobody. The department proved to be very expensive, but when the facts were exposed at the last session of Parliament he himself became ashamed of it and promised that he would discontinue it. It lasted from the 9th day of November, 1917, until the 31st day of December, 1919. You will notice, Mr. Speaker, the significant date on which it started,-the 9th day of November, 1917. During that period this Department cost the country $200,986.54. Now, whatever value it may have had as a political agency

to assist the Union Government, he would be a bold man who would say that it was worth two hundred cents to the people of Canada. At the last session the President of the Council said that he would abolish it. Instead of abolishing it, as he said he would, he continued it under a new name. That fact is disclosed (by the following questions and answers:
Is Mr. M. E. Nichols, formerly Director of Public Information, still in the employ of the Government?
Mr. Rowell: Yes.
If so, what is his position, what are his duties, and what salary is he being paid?
Mr. Rowell: Director of Information, Department of External Affairs. Salary, $5,000 per annum.
Last year he was "Director of Public Information"; this year he is "Director of Information." The man is the same; the master is the same; the salary is the same; the duties are the same; everything is the same, except the name; he is now "Director of Information."
But that is not all. The President of the Council not only kept' the Department of Information alive under a new name; he started a new one in New York under Colonel John A. Cooper. A few weeks ago 1 asked for information about this new method of spending money and the minister in his reply referred me to an Order in Council dated July 17, 1919. I secured a copy of that Order in Council and it was disclosed, to my astonishment, that the money to pay the salary of this gentleman and his staff was improperly taken out of the money voted by Parliament' for war purposes. Let me read the Order in Council:



P.C. 1480.

[Stage Direction]
One thousand four hundred and eighty; I suppose that indicates the number of Orders in Council passed during 'the year up to that date.
Certified copy of a Report of the Committee of the Privy Council, approved by His Excellency the Governor General on the 17th July, 1919.
The Committee of the Privy Council, on the recommendation of the Right Honourable the Prime Minister, advise that pursuant to paragraph 4 of the Order in Council of the 24th February, 1919, P.C. 265-Lieutenant-Colonel John A. Cooper, Toronto, Ontario, of the 198th Overseas Battalion, be appointed Director of Canadian News Service at New York, at a salary of five thousand ($5,000) dollars per annum.
The committee on the same recommendation further advise that the Director of Canadian News Service at New York shall be under the supervision of the Canadian War Mission at Washington or of such representative of the Canadian Government at Washington as shall hereafter be appointed.
The committee on the same recommendation also advise that the salaries and expenses-

This is the point.
-of the office to be established for the purposes set forth in the said Order in Council of the 24th February, 1918, be paid out of the demobilization appropriation through the Department of External Affairs.
Rodolphe Boudreau,
Clerk of the Privy Council.
Andrew Ross McMaster: What is the date of that?


John Howard Sinclair: July 17, 1919. This money was voted for the defence and security of Canada and for the demobilization of our forces. Parliament was not told that any part of this vote would be used for the purpose of finding soft jobs for political favourites. This is a violation of a well-established principle, a principle that has prevailed in Great Britain since the days of Edward III, that money must 'be spent by the executive for the purpose for which that money was voted by Parliament and for no other. When I placed the question on the Order Paper I asked who this gentleman, Colonel John A. Cooper, was. I have since discovered that he is one of those vermiculating patriots who figured in the election of 1917. He was returning officer at Witley Camp, and when the ballot box over which he presided was opened it was discovered that it was stuffed with parcels of ballots that could not have possibly gone through the aperture. Over sixty per cent of the ballots in that box were illegally marked for constituencies in which the voters had no right to vote. You see, therefore, that it was necessary that something should be done to reward Colonel John A. Cooper. His job is to tell the American newspapers what smart men we have here in the Union Government. Here is a sample which appeared in a New York paper. I have no proof that this is from the pen of Colonel Cooper, but I suspect very strongly that it is. Anyway, this is how it reads:
That distinguished Canadian statesman, the Hon. N. W. Rowell, who is frequently mentioned as a probable successor to Sir Robert Borden, has arrived in the city en route to Washington, where he will represent Canada at the Labour Congress.
Now, this News Bureau is estimated to cost $30,000 per year, but as you can see, Mr. Speaker, a few items like that would show that the money was very well spent. These are merely sample bricks.
In regard to a large part of the public expenditure, hon. members can form no definite opinion, because they are denied reasonable information. When the Minister of Railways did not wish to tell his supporter from South Cape Breton (Mr. Doug-

las) what he was paying for coal for his ships in Halifax, he told the hon. member that the business was being carried on by a joint stock company and that the Department of Railways and Canals did not know anything about it. And even when information is given it is often of an uncertain and haphazard character; not only is it haphazard, but it sometimes looks extremely suspicious. Public money is spent without any account being given. Everybody remembers the case of DeWitt Foster, the man who got $72,000 to buy war horses in Nova Scotia. He is said to have purchased some old. decrepit, spavined and blind horses in Nova Scotia, but the Government never got any account of the transactions. The point I want to make is that $72,000 was handed out to Air. Foster and up to this date the Government do not know what he did with the money. After the investigation took place and that scandal was exposed, we had reason to hope that that system would be corrected, but that, loose method of doing business seems to be still in vogue in the Alilitia Department. If proof is required of this, I would refer you to the fourth volume of the Auditor General's report which we were fortunate enough to get two or three days ago, at page ZZ-300. It would seem to be a common thing to peddle out money without asking the person who gets it what he is going to do with it. On page ZZ-300, these items are to be found:
Adams, H. A., Ste. Agathe: Advance unaccounted for	$50
Allen, James, Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 75
Then turning to page ZZ-301, the following items are to be found:
Boate, G. A., Ottawa: Advances to be accounted for in 1919-20	 200
Campbell, Major R. G., Ottawa: Advance
unaccounted for	 150
Casey, J. F., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	   50
Church, Lieut. G. W. F., Ottawa: Advance
unaccounted for	 200
Conrad, Lieut. F. B., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	$100
Donaldson, J. L., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 100
Dore, Ben, Ottawa: Advances unaccounted for	 125
Then on page ZZ-302, these items are to be found:
Edwards, Lieut. T. F. R., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted	for	 150
Gilling, E. F., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 250
Haines, F. P., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	  150
Harper, W. S.f Ottawa: Advances unaccounted for		200
Then, turning to page ZZ-303:
Labbe, M. H., Ottawa:	Advance unaccounted for	 97
Lamrock, J. S., Hamilton: Advance unaccounted for	 100
Layton, B. M., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 100
Lowe, Lieut. L., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 150
Mansbridge, A. S., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 100
Mesurier, A. L., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for in 1919-1920	 200
Morris, Lieut. W. O., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 100
Munsey, W. S., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 100
McGinley, W. G., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	| ..	100
McNaughton, E. M., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 100
Turning to page ZZ-304:
Patterson, W. J., Ottawa: Advance unaccounted for	 200
We have here no less than twenty-four cases on five pages of Volume IV of the Auditor General's report of men who received money nearly two years ago without its being accounted for.


Mr. W. H. WHITE:: Are there any expenses that are accounted for?


John Howard Sinclair: Certain expenses are accounted for, but these are items not accounted for. Although most of these men reside in Ottawa, nobody seems to have taken the trouble to call on them to find out what they did with this money, it would almost look as if any one could walk into the office of the Department of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment and help himself and snap his fingers at the Auditor General. But that is not the worst. Enormous sums of money seem to have been sent overseas that are not accounted for. The Auditor General's reports for both last year and this year show that large sums of money have disappeared in London, no report of them having been given to Ottawa. Let us first look at the Auditor General's report of the 31st March, 1918, that is the one we got a year ago. On page ZZ-218, you will find an item of $119,546,597.93 for which no vouchers have been received, although the expenditure was apparently made in 1917. This year a similar item appears in the fourth volume of the Auditor General's report, page ZZ-228. The item this year is $129,308,233.14, less refunded-it appears that some of this came back to the treasury -$7,668,216.52, leaving a balance unaccounted for of $121,640,016.12. The only difference between the statement of a year ago and that of this year is that there is

an increase of about $2,000,000. No one will contend that it requires three years to produce vouchers in the Militia Department. The Auditor General is not to blame. In 1917 the Auditor General appears to have discovered that large sums were expended of which no account was given, and the late Auditor General, John Fraser, urged the Militia Department to take action. The department in Ottawa appears to have done so, but the trouble was with the department overseas. This is the correspondence :	.
Auditor Generates Office.
September 15, 1917.
Sir,-"fkith reference to vouchers for expenditures in England, I have received no vouchers for 1917-18. It is necessary that these vouchers should he forwarded regularly to enable this office to properly check the accounts. Kindly let me know when I may receive vouchers covering expenditure for as late a date as possible.
I am sir,
Your obedient servant,
J. Fraser, A.G.
Deputy Minister for
Militia and Defence.
Department of Militia and Defence,
Ottawa, September 24, 1917.
Sir,-Replying to your letter of the 15th instant regarding vouchers for expenditures in England, this matter has been taken up repeatedly with the authorities overseas, by cable and letter, but without much success. A memorandum has -lately been prepared for the information of the Honourable the Minister, with a view to his communicating with the Minister Overseas. I trust that this will have the desired effect.
I am, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
E. F. Jarvis,
Acting D.M.
The Auditor General.
The Auditor General demanded these vouchers in 1917; he demanded them in 1918; he demanded them in 1919; we are now living in 1920, and apparently he has not the vouchers yet.


Mr. MACKENZIE KING:: What is the amount?


John Howard Sinclair: The amount that has disappeared without any account having been given is, roughly speaking, $121,000,000. And the question now is-what has become of this $121,000,000? The minister does not know; the deputy does not know; the department does not know; the Auditor General does not know; and Parliament does not know. There is apparently not a scrap of paper in the possession of the Government to show what has become of that $121,000,000.
rMT. J. H. Sinclair.l
If, Sir, you desire 'further evidence of the brand of economy that is practised by this Government, look at the record of appointments to the Civil Service. Certain hon. gentlemen about the opening of the present session were boasting about the number of Government jobs that had been given out, and I took advantage of my privilege to ask this question:
How many appointments have been made by the Board of Civil Service Commissioners since the date of the Armistice?
The answer I got was:
Permanent	 4,176
Temporary	 22,954
27,130
That is to say, commencing on the day of the Armistice up to the date that this question was asked, the board of the Civil Service Commissioners appointed more than fifty civil servants every day, including Sundays.


Mr. M. CLARK:: And then the Government expect a reduction.


John Howard Sinclair: But do they? It is incredible to me to think that 27 regiments of 1,000 each have been appointed to the Civil Service since the Armistice;'but if you wish, Sir, to verify that statement, you can look at the answer given me by the Secretary of State as reported on page 324 of Hansard. In that answer I was informed that some of the 22,954 temporary appoints were for short'periods, and in order to get all the facts correctly, I asked this second question:
How many of the 22,954 temporary appointees are still on the payroll of the Government?
I got no reply to that question. It was made into an order for a return, and I shall probably not get the answer until next year. The first question was answered within three or four days of the time I asked it. I do not want to be suspicious, but I am sure that it would have been much easier to answer that second question than the first one I asked. Not having received an answer to it, I shall have to make an estimate myself. The dismissals, I understand, were few. I think we can assume that 25,000 of the 27,130 are still on the pay-roll. If they are, and we estimate that they receive $1,000 each per year, that would add $25,000,000 to the expenditure on civil government for the year. But $1,000 is too little. I estimate that they will ge-t on an average $2,000 apiece, and in that case the addition to our public expenditure

on that account for the year would be $50,000,000. Is it any wonder that the country is going into debt at the rate of a million dollars a day? And all this is in face of the fact that every department of the Government was overcrowded at the time that these appointments were being made.
With reference to the proposed tariff changes, all I have to say is that they are very meagre. The concessions to the consumer are v.ery slight. There is not much in this Budget for the common man. His bread, his boots, his clothing, will not be any cheaper. The implements of production are still required to bear a very heavy burden. In camp-meeting parlance, which my hon. friend from Fraser Valley (Mr. Stacey) will understand, the concessions outlined in this Budget would he called "small mercies." I question very much if the farmer can be caught with that kind of chaff. Mr. Speaker, you have been brought up in town and are not as familiar with country life as I am, but no doubt you have been in the country sometimes on your holidays and you must have seen a farmer out in the pasture trying to catch a spirited horse with a handful of oats in his hat or in a tin basin. When he has caught the horse you must have seen him rub the horse's nose while he was getting the bit into his mouth and the throat strap securely buckled, and then pat him gently on the back preparatory to mounting him. I was just wondering if the Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton) could catch a low-tariff colt like my hon. friend from Strathcona (Mr. Douglas) or my hon. friend from Lethbridge (Mr. Buchanan) with such a shabby dishful of oats as this. Take instead the Liberal tariff platform. Here it is:
That the best interests of Canada demand that substantial reductions of the burdens of customs taxation be made with a view to the accomplishing of two purposes of the highest importance; First: diminishing the very high cost of living which presses so severely on the masses of the people; Second, reducing the cost of the instruments of production in the industries based on the natural resources of the Dominion, the vigorous development of which is essential to the progress and prosperity of our country.
That, to these ends, wheat, wheat flour and all products of wheat: the principal articles of food; farm implements and machinery; farm tractors, mining, flour and saw-mill machinery and repair parts thereof; rough and partly dressed lumber; gasoline, illuminating, lubricating and fuel oils; nets, net-twines and fishermen's equipments; cements and fertilizers, should be free from customs duties, as well as the raw material entering into the same.
That a revision downwards of the tariff should be made whereby substantial reductions
should be effected in the duties on wearing apparel and footwear, and on other articles of general consumption (other than luxuries), as well as on the raw material entering into the manufacture ofthe same.
That the British preference be increased to 50 per cent of the general tariff.
And the Liberal party hereby pledges itself to implement by legislation the provision of this resolution when returned to power.
That, Sir, is the platform on which I stand, and the platform which I shall submit to my electors if I am a candidate at th| next election. I regret that this platform does not meet the views of my hon. friend from Fraser Valley, although I understand he is a free trader in principle. The appeal he made last night on behalf of the British Columbia apple growers touched the hearts of hon. gentlemen opposite and he received a great deal of applause. I have been told that my hon. friend is a free trader in everything else excepting apples, but, as with our common ancestor while free trade is sound in principle, the temptation of the apple was too much for him. We fully recognize that the adoption of this tariff platform will result in a loss of revenue, but revenue must be secured and will be secured from some other source. This tariff platform is a great forward step and by taking this step at a time when revenue is so important the Liberal party have shown the courage of their convictions, and they have become to this extent the underwriters of progress and commercial freedom in this country.
But there is an even more important question than tariff reform, and that is the restoration of Parliamentary government in Canada. The election of 1917 was, to say the least, a very artificial affair. I do not believe the people of Canada had any idea at that time as to the kind of chicken they were hatching, and I believe they are now ready and anxious to rectify their mistake. Besides, Parliament, such as it is, is ignored, and the business of the country is carried on in secret conclave behind closed doors. The conclave itself has ceased to be a representative conclave. Our large French-speaking population is without representation in the Government, there being not a single cabinet minister, with the exception of the Prime Minister, from east of Montreal. It cannot be denied that this Government is hanging on to office without any mandate from the people. Unrest and distrust prevail to a greater degree than ever before. I submit that the remedy is a general election. Let the people decide. If the people are dis-



satisfied with this Government,
5 p.m. as I think they are, let them have an opportunity to turn the Government out bag and baggage and replace them with a Government in which they will have confidence. Confidence always counts for more than police forces and criminal penalties. Would not every sane man in Canada welcome a return to the conditions that existed during that golden period in our country's history from 1896 to 1911-a period when the land was first reserved for the settler, instead of being granted to great railroad companies; a period in which were carved out and started on their splendid career the western provinces; a period when the stranger within our gates was made welcome and treated like a free man in a free country; a period of overflowing surpluses, instead of bottomless deficits; a period when we built railways out of revenue and tax-exempt bonds were unknown; a period when letters were carried for two cents and the Post Office Department showed a handsome surplus; a period when profiteering was rare and the workingman could eat ibacon and eggs for breakfast and give his children butter instead of oleomargarine; a period when penal laws were few and the farmer's bee could stray into the sugar bowl without the farmer going to gaol for thirty days; a period when a man could blow his nose in 'his own way without asking the 'Secretary of State or the President of the Privy Council anything about it; a period when Parliament was consulted and Orders in Council were only resorted to in matters of routine; a period in which Canada first became known to the world as "daughter in her mother's house and mistress in her own." It was in short a period of fifteen years of good, clean, honest and progressive government. Is it any wonder, Mr. Speaker, that it is known as the golden period of Canada's history? Let us therefore ask the Canadian people whether they wish to perpetuate this present combination of decayed Conservatism and un-united Unionism, or whether they would prefer to place a new pilot in charge of the ship. Let the people decide, and we on this side of the House will cheerfully accept the verdict of the people, whatever that -verdict may be.


Mr. W. C. KENNEDY (North Essex):: other evidence of the desire of hon. gentlemen opposite to give us in this country a paternal form of government, which is as exasperating as it is absurd.
I said, Sir, there was a field open to the Government in the collection of taxation and I congratulate the Finance Minister that he has at last consented to adopt the American system. Two years ago when speaking during the Budget debate I urged the adoption of this system but apparently there was no desire to make collections promptly and to-day we find it is only applied, if I followed the minister correctly, to the income tax. The business profits tax will be collected, in the same old way.
I appreciate these profits may be very difficult to arrive at, but there should be clearly defined rulings governing depreciation, etc., printed and circulated, and whenever a ruling is made by the department publicity should be given to it through the press. The firm or corporation need not necessarily be named, but there should be uniformity, and then we would not have, as we have to-day, a feeling in the country that some firms are more generously treated than others. If this is done it will not be difficult for corporations to send in their cheques for 25 per cent of what they think they owe, and surely the account may be adjusted just as readily under these conditions as if no money accompanies the return.
Let me mention this year's experience in the First Michigan District-The Collector of Customs at Detroit is in charge ot income tax returns for this district, and the deputy collector informed me that by the 15th March this year they had filed with them 130,000 returns, covering incomes up to $5,000 per annum and 25,000 returns covering corporation taxes and amounts in excess of $5,000, and he further informed' me that of 130,000 returns of sums less than $5,000, 95 per cent of the tax payers paid the full yearly payment. Hon. gentlemen will appreciate what this means-the large amount of money that is immediately available to the Government of the country and the great saving effected in interest on money borrowed by the Government in order to carry on. In this country it did not matter that the man had the money to pay, he had to wait until he received his tax return. In the meantime his money was lying at the local bank perhaps without interest, and if interest were allowed, at most 3 per cent and the Government were paying the banks an increased rate for the money actually theirs but not available owing to the method of collection.
[Mr Kennedy.]
If the Minister of Finance is sincere and his department are actually trying to collect Business Profits and Income Taxes I would strongly urge a change in the proposed system to include business profits tax. As far as a reduction in the business profits tax is concerned I think it is a move in the right way. I believe the business profits tax contributes in no small degree to the high cost of living. It encourages extravagance upon the part of the manufacturer and adds unnessarily to the cost of output. Tax the income derived from manufacturing as high as you like. In the way I have suggested you will obtain revenue without interfering with the necessary growth and expansion of business.
In addition to imposing and collecting taxation it is equally the duty of the Government to carefully guard revenues and, wherever possible to eliminate unnecessary expense. What excuse is there for carrying on, say, the Board of Commerce? Here is a commission floating round the country at the public expense and, as far as the results go, practically Useless. It was absolutely absurd to appoint that board with a view of controlling prices. They could not hope to do that. Prices cannot be regulated artificially with any degree of success. The only way prices can be lowered is by production, and by the people recognizing that extravagance is a large factor in keeping them high. The Government should set the example. They should practice the greatest economy and cut out all unnecessary expense. No Board of Commerce can arbitrarily affect the situation, and I believe that board should be discharged at once. They are absolutely of no more use tfian a fifth wheel to a coach.
Take the Wheat Board, nobody knows what that has cost the country. It is true that hon. gentleman opposite say the Government are not paying the expense, but the people have to pay it in the long run and it makes no difference who issues the pay cheques. I do not know what is the attitude of our western friends with reference to this board, but I can say as far as the producers in our section are concerned they want none of it. We had rather a sad experience with the board in my constituency. Let me relate the circumstances: This year, after the United States Government lifted its embargo against Canadian wheat, I made an application on behalf of some of our farmers for permission to export about 3,000 bushels of wheat to the United States. After waiting approximately a month and getting two or three

2G47
answers that were rather contradictory, the reply finally came: No, we cannot permit you to export wheat. Now what were the conditions? There is no mill on the Canadian side within fifty miles of where these men live, and the Commercial Milling Company of Detroit were willing to buy. They had a paved road from their farms less than eight miles from Detroit-the price being paid by the Wheat Board was $1.90 and a participation certificate. The American mill offered to pay them from $2.35 to $2.59, which, with the exchange as it then stood, was as good as $2.90 per bushel, but the Wheat Board would not issue a permit. They took this attitude notwithstanding that our money was at a discount in the United States and we should have been glad of the opportunity of getting all the good American money we could. The Wheat Board insisted that the wheat would have to be shipped by rail and then exported in all probability to Greece or Rou-manit. to be paid for in the sweet by and by.
Is it any wonder the people of this country are dissatisfied and discontented? Today the price of Ontario wheat is, say, $1,95 with participation certificate. The Americans are paying $3 at Detroit with exchange, making the price $3.33.
Let me read you a letter on this subject which I received from one of our prominent farmers. It is as follows:
Tecumseh, May 11, 1920.
Dear Sir,-You will no doubt remember the efforts I have made to the Wheat Board to sell my wheat in Detroit and have so far been turned down.
It is not necessary for me here to give my opinion of the unjust treatment of the Wheat Board, especially this western part of Ontario, knowing that you are fully conversant with the conditions here and what we are up against. I am told on good authority that a large number ot farmers have sold their Government wheat certificates to speculators for 10 cents per bushel, and this only nets them $2 per bushel. I noticed in our paper some time ago that the Board would pay around 40 cents per bushel for the wheat certificates. Even at that it would give us $2.30 per bushel for any wheat, which would be by far the cheapest hog feed we could get, with corn selling at $2 per bushel and oats at $1.20.
I am still holding up my wheat in hopes I may be able to sell at a market price. Wheat last Saturday was worth in Detroit $3 per bushel, with 11 cents exchange, which would make our wheat worth to us $3.33.
We farmers are asked to produce in order to even up the balance of trade. If speculators. Wheat Boards, etc., are going to take the profits of our production they will soon have to do the producing too.
Not wishing to take up your valuable time, I will state the object of this note to you, and that is the following questions:
Can you tell if the Wheat Board releases their control of wheat in Ontario on the 1st of July next, and if not, can the balance unsold in farmers' hands of the 1919 wheat be sold with this year's crop and prices?
If I do not get an open market or a market price for my wheat I shall feed it to my stock.
If you can give me any information on the above questions I would be greatly obliged.
That is the way the Wheat Board stands in the estimation of the farmers in our district, and the Government would be well advised if they resolved to discontinue its operation. There is another board to which reference was made this afternoon by my good friend from Antigonish and Guys-borough (Mr. Sinclair), and that is the pub-licitj board that now exists in the city of New 'i ork. I understand from the Order in Council that it costs approximately $30,009 a year, and I could suggest to the Minister of Finanee a better way of spending that money, by which he would obtain far better results than keeping a bureau in the United States merely for the purpose of telling the people there what a great people we are. As I understand it, the duties of that board or commission consist in attending social gatherings and business meetings and telling people what the possibilities commercially and industrially of Canada are. Well, I can say, living close to the American border as I do, that generally speaking the American people, especially the business men, know pretty well what things are like in Canada, and particularly there is nothing . that affects our credit which they do not know. With that in view I am going to suggest to my hon. friend the Minister of Finance that he take that $30,000 and buy New7 York exchange with it and make good the promise of this country in so far as outstanding bonds are concerned. 1 am taking this matter up at the request of the bondholders of Detroit and also of bond salesmen of Windsor, who feel that something should be done. I would suggest to the minister that this is not a matter in connection with which one can adopt any ostrich-like policy. What the bankers of Detroit know to-day the bankers of New York know to-morrow, and what the bankers of New York know the investors of the United States know the day following. If we are going to hold up our credit in the United States and throughout the world, then the Government must handle this matter boldly, courageously and in a proper manner. Last fall we placed a loan of $300,000,000 and I have here a prospectus stating definitely and clearly that both principal and interest will be paid in gold. At the urgent solicitation of the Cen-

tral Selling Committee, we in the city of Windsor went across to Detroit and sold over $1,000,000 worth of bonds. We represented the bonds as they were represented to us, as gold bonds; we said that the interest and principal would be payable in gold. Instalments of interest have come due and we find that when the coupons are presented for payment the holders of them are told that by reason of an Order in Council which existed no gold can be exported. These men were depending on the word of this Government; they were relying upon the good faith of this Dominion; and in all fairness, they say that if there was an Order in Council providing that payments should not be made in gold it should have appeared on the face of the bond. They ask: " Why did you not tell us what we were purchasing?" I have a letter from one of our bond salesmen, a prominent citizen in Windsor, and this is what he says:
Windsor, May 14th, 1920.
W. C. Kennedy, M.P.,
Ottawa, Ont.
Dear Mr. Kennedy:
This Canadian Government of ours seems determined to keep me in hot water. You may recall that last Fall 1 wrote you relative to some unpleasantness that had arisen as a result of the sale of Canadian War Bonds to the President of one of the Savings Banks of Detroit.
When I approached this gentleman on the matter of purchasing these bonds he said, in effect: "Why, I don't want to buy bonds payable in depreciated currency." But, I countered glibly, "these bonds are payable in gold, both interest and principal. See, it says so right on the bonds, and my Government never violates or repudiates its pledges. The interest is payable in gold in any branch of any chartered bank in Canada, so all you'll have to do is to send your coupons to Windsor to be cashed." I made the sale, several thousand dollars.
When the interest fell due last November the Imperial Bank in Windsor promptly refused payment in gold, but after some delay and correspondence with the Finance Department in Ottawa payment was finally made. And now, on the next interest date, the bank again refuses payment and here's what the Banker said to me; "So your Government never repudiates its pledges, eh! Well, we in the United States thought we entered the War to help hammer the Hun into a realization that the solemn undertakings of the Governments were not soraps of paper. We hadn't any idea that Canada was in this class, but the very first time I have business with your Government, instead of meeting its obligations without evasion, equivocation or question, I am forced to chase it around and dun it, much as we bankers have to do in the case of the maker of a bad note. If your Government can't pay or wont pay, let it say so and I'll charge it oft to profit and loss, but the next time you peddle any of your so-called securities please choose some other victim."
Now, you know with my six feet and 185 pounds I easily qualify for the heavyweight

class and could make almost any Yankee eat those words, but I haven't the heart to tackle the job in this case because I believe he is right. Perhaps, though, you or the Minister of Finance or Mackenzie King, or Lloyd George, or somebody, can suggest a less heroic method of keeping our honour untarnished. Will you try, please? In the meantime as a bond salesman for the Canadian Government (without commission) I'm through. I seem to have misrepresented the goods. In my innocence I thought that when the Government said it would pay in gold it meant exactly what it said. From now on I'll fight shy of governments and do more business with institutions and individuals who don't welch when the time comes to pay.
Now, I would again call the attention of the minister to the fact that if he values as I do, and as I believe every man here does, the credit of the Dominion, the first thin" he must do is to take charge of this affair .boldly and with courage and pay those people as they should be paid. There is no better way of retaining our credit. I have protest after protest, in this matter, and I hope the hon. minister will find some way of redeeming the promise which his Government made.
There is another matter ito which I should like to direct the attention of the House for a moment, one that is engaging some public attention to-day-the question of subsidies. Most of us in Canada who knew something of the. financial condition of the country and iwho knew that this country was being loaded with bankrupt railroads felt that at least so far as subsidies were concerned we should not hear any more about them for some time. But they .seem to have broken out in a new place; we hear a good deal now of subsidies to shipbuilding companies. There seems to be an organized plan to raid the public treasury. Now, Canada has done pretty well for the shipbuilding industry, at all events so far as helping them to get started is concerned. I have here a prospectus issued by a bond house dealing with the St. John Drydock and Shipbuilding Company Limited, showing that the Government of Canada have agreed under certain conditions to assist this company to the extent of $247,500 per annum for a period of thirty-five years. I have no doubt the Government have been equally generous to other shipbuilding concerns. In addition to that we have given contracts to the shipbuilding companies aggregating $75,000,000, certainly at fairly good prioes, because they are all back for more. On top of that we are asked to provide a subsidy or bonus for tonnage. I am very much surprised that this request has come so soon-I see, by the number of

deputations arriving, that it is on its way. So far as deputations are concerned we all know how these are arranged for; we know a good deal about what has resulted in the past. Many deputations came here in days gone by for subsidies for railroads -these very railroads we own to-day-and shortly after the subsidy was granted it turned out the greater portion of it went into the pockets of the gentlemen who promoted the enterprise and who at that particular time were being featured as Empire builders. I noticed in the Ottawa Citizen the other day this very illuminating despatch:	[DOT]
Sydney, N.S. May 13th.-A resolution calling upon the Dominion Government to subsidize a shipbuilding industry in Eastern Canada was passed at a meetings of the Board of Trade held to-day at the request of the Canada Steamship Lines, one of the companies entering the steel shipping merger.
I am very much surprised at that, because I understood from the announcements that were made in the public press that this new merger did not propose to ask Canada for any financial aid. We were told that there were three great fundamentals which entered into the building up of commerce; natural resources which we had, capital, and the benefit of the experience of the Old Land,-all three would bind together the Empire in the golden chains of commerce. Well, Sir, that was most appealing, but if the people of this country are going to be asked by way of subsidy to supply the gold for the chains, then I am very much opposed to it. The sooner the gentlemen who are promoting these subsidies understand just where we stand on that question; the sooner they realize that the people are in no mood to create a new group of millionaires, even if they be in the shipbuilding business, and that the financial position of this country is not such as to warrant the granting of the aid they are seeking, the better it will be for all concerned.
So far as the tariff is concerned, I regret, as the resolution of the member for Shelburne and Queen's (Mr. Fielding) stated, that the Government did not, as they promised last year, have an investigation into tariff conditions and bring about a revision of the tariff. I represent a manufacturing constituency, but I have no hesitation in saying that the time has come when the tariff should be revised, and as far as I know there is only one way that the tariff can be revised with satisfaction to the people of this country, and that is
downwards. If there are manufacturers in this country who are taking advantage of t'he tariff to extract the last five-oent piece from the consumer, then the Government should act and act quickly. This is one way to restore the public confidence so essential at the present time to carry on successfully the Government of this country.
I would also suggest that hon. gentlemen opposite take seriously into consideration the desirability of cutting down the expenditure in connect'on with these boards and commissions that we have been talking about this afternoon. Until we remove restrictions on trade and allow the business of this country to take its natural course and follow the usual channel of supply and demand, there will be no relief from the abnormal conditions that prevail.
At Six o'clock the House took recess.
After Recess.
The House resumed at Eight o'clock.


Mr. ONESIPHORE TURGEON (Gloucester) :: Mr. Speaker, in rising to express my views on the Budget which is now before the House I wish at the outset to tender my sincere congratulations to the Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton) upon the honest and lucid statement he has given to the House of the country's financial condition at the present time and of the taxation which the people will have to bear this year. He has given us statements which have not been given in previous Budget speeches. In this matter he has shown that honesty of purpose which always characterized the more judicial statements which he made while chairman of the Railway Commission. While acting in that capacity he made a reputation for himself for honesty and clear judgment, and these same qualities were displayed in the speech he made when introducing the Budget. With the facts and figures he gave, some of which must be amazing to the people of Canada, he mingled patriotic expressions, and in noble language he expressed his gratitude to the returned soldiers, whom we must never forget now nor in the years to come. It was their courage and virtue which gave to Canada the fame she now enjoys among the nations of the world, and which contributed more than anything else to the great status apparently accorded this country by all the great nations. We owe our soldiers all possible gratitude. We shall never forget their energy, their valour, their heroism. We shall never for-

get Langemarck, where in the early days of the war the Canadian soldiers were left without reinforcements, but using the bodies of their comrades as a rampart withstood the attacks of the enemy until reinforcements came, and saved the day for Canada and the Empire. There are many other deeds of theirs which we might recall, but this is the battle we should never forget, because but for the Canadian soldiers on that occasion the war would have been lost, not only .to Canada and the Empire, but to Belgium and France, and to humanity. I was pleased, therefore, that te Minister of Finance did not forget to give expression to the sentiments of gratitude which we entertain towards our returned soldiers as well as towards the women of Canada who worked marvellously in every possible direction for their sons, brothers and husbands at the front with a spirit not only of loyalty and generosity but of Christianity, to help preserve the liberty and freedom we enjoy to-day.
There is one statement of the Minister of Finance to which I wish to call particular attention, and which I give him credit for having made, and that is his explanation of the discrepancy that exists between our net debt and our gross debt. That discrepancy amounts to $1,078,537,461.27, and the thinking people of Canada have been asking themselves for some time how it came to be so large, and whether it was really a fact or only imaginary. The Finance Minister has given the House to understand that a great portion of this discrepancy between our net and our gross debt is made up of investments which may not be realizable for many years to come, and some of them perhaps never, as he expressed it himself. He has shown that the net debt was $2,273,305,4.35, and the gross debt $3,014,483,774.12, the discrepancy being made up of loans and investments, a great many of which cannot be relied on as realizable.
I now turn to some of the details of the Budget, more particularly the taxes which the people of Canada will have to bear this year. No doubt the Minister of Finance has exercised his best efforts and best judgment to endeavour to relieve, if possible, the situation existing in the mind of the people of Canada. Of course, he has not been able to do all he would have wished to do. That would be impossible for any man in Canada in bringing down a Budget under the present conditions due to the terrible war. I had, however, expected more generous treatment from the Minister oi Finance for those who are less able to carry the burden of taxation. No doubt he has

done the best he could, but I am afraid that just before passing the threshold of the Council chamber when he was going in with his proposals he was told "Abandon hope," and consequently he has not been able to accomplish all he would like to do. He has given us, I think, the best perfected Tory Budget we have had in this country yet,- for this is a Tory Budget, more particularly as regards the taxes it imposes on the common people. We know that of the people of Canada, ninety-five per cent have to struggle for their living as against the five per cent who have in plenty the goods of this world.
There is one new tax which the minister has imposed to help to pay the debt of the country and the annual interest upon it, which struck me more particularly, and that is the sales tax. That tax hits, apparently, the manufacturer, the wholesaler and the dealer. One per cent has been added to the manufacturer's price. But the manufacturer and the wholesale dealer will add that tax of one per cent to the retailer's price, and the retailer will add that one per cent again to his price and he will take his profit on it. This will clean up everything and in the end it will be the consumer who will have to pay the tax of one per cent. Nobody else but the consumer will pay, whether the article be worth $1 or $10 or $100. The consumer has to pay the tax on everything that he buys. The soldier has had to pay the extra prices caused by profiteering in the textile and woollen business particularly since the war by being charged excessive prices for the suits of clothes- that he has had to buy since he came back from the field of battle. The minister has imposed a new tax on goods supposed to be needed by the common people, or by the people who are not endowed with the goods of this world, commencing with boots and shoes above $9. We know that $9 is a terrible price to pay for a pair of ordinary boots and shoes. It was a terribe price some years ago, but to-day we are confronted with the position that a pair of boots at $9 is only equivalent to a pair of boots that was selling at $3, $4 or $5 a few years ago. If the workingman wants to buy a pair of boots that will save his feet from the wet, the dust and the stones for a month or two, he will not do that by buying a pair of boots at $9. We know that a woman who wants to buy a pair of boots to wear while she is doing her work in the house, or while she is travelling on the streets or the roads in the country will have to pay more than $9. Therefore, the shoes which she will have to buy, being

above $9, will be subject to the tax; if she buys a pair at $4 or $5 they will only last a week or two because they are made of paper instead of leather. She is obliged to buy a pair of boots at $9 or over in order to economize as much as possible. Therefore, this is a new tax that will fall more particularly on the mass of the people. The same may be said in regard to the tax on clothing. No suit of clothes that, from the point of view of economy, is worth buying or wearing, is sold to-day under $45. This condition also applies to many other articles of clothing. This new tax which my hon. friend has imposed falls more particularly upon those who have the least means to pay it.
The tax on luxuries is certainly one which commends itself to my judgment. I have advocated it myself. The only doubtful thing about it is that we may make it so high that people will not purohase or import luxuries. I beg to congratulate my hon. friend upon his decision in this matter and to say that I approve of the tax on luxuries. The tax on imported liquors, wines and spirits may bring in a revenue for a year or so, but if Canada realizes our hope, as I trust it will, of becoming a temperance country, this tax will not bring in any great amount of revenue in the years to come.
Before proceeding to a general consideration of the Budget and of the fiscal question as it affects Canada to-day and will affect her in the future, I wish to say that I was amazed, this afternoon at the statements given by my hon. friend from An-tigonish and Guysborough (Mr. Sinclair). The facts and figures which he gave constituted an indictment against the Government, and it was certainly amazing that no one on the other side oif the House, not one of the ministers, not one of their supporters, rose to contradict, if a contradiction were possible at all, the indictment that will be carried by the wires throughout this country and outside of it. Certainly when these facts were so amazing I would have thought that some of the ministers would have got up and shown at least some resentment at their having been placed before the House. Although the hon. Secretary of State (Mr. Siifton) was present, he listened to the indictment apparently with complacency notwithstanding that many of these statements were directed at his own department in connection with its management of the Printing Bureau. However, I am not familiar enough with the charges and figures brought forward by my hon. friend to discuss them at length and I only wish to express my disappointment at having heard no contradiction of the statements which he placed before the House.
Coming to the great question which occupies the minds of the people of Canada, the question as to the future, I wish, to ask the indulgence of the House for a few moments while I express a view that I have already expressed in this House and which I hold as firmly to-day as ever I did. I know it will not meet with the approval of my hon. friends on the other side of the House, and especially my hon. friend the Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton) if we are to judge him by the Budget which he has brought down. Meanwhile I wish to repeat on this occasion that, notwithstanding the adverse reports which strike our ears to-day, I am as much a free trader as ever I was. I am a free trader in principle, a free trader in theory and in practice. When I speak of free trade, permit me to say that I do not give expression to a mere opinion nor to a cherished idea; I speak the convictions which have grown firmer and firmer in my mind as a result of prolonged study of the question of protection and free trade as it has been developed from time to time in the different countries of the world.
I have arrived at my convictions as the result of a study of Adam Smith, Cobden, and Gladstone, and I am fortified in them by the views so strongly and courageously expressed by my hon. friend from Red Deer (Mr. Michael Clark) whom I am pleased to see just now in his seat. That hon. gentleman has always been consistent, notwithstanding the conditions under which he at times has had to speak, in his advocacy of a free trade policy for Canada. In order to dispel any suspicions that might exist as to my adherence to that party let me say that it was my lot, whether for good or ill, to have lived for some seven or eight years in the city of New York in the eighties and the early nineties, at a time when Henry George, that great exponent of free trade, was exciting the admiration and the interest of the people of the United . States, and particularly those of the great city to which I have referred. It was my lot at that time to be able to follow his principle as personally expounded by him and to study them closely. I had the good fortune to hear Henry George address great audiences in the Cooper Institute. I have always borne in mind the expressions which I heard him utter at that time, and though his doctrines were slow in making their

way in the minds of the American people yet to-day they seem to he achieving the effect which was hoped for many years ago, and we now see a re-action in the public mind in the United States in favour of free trade. Sometimes doctrines may be enunciated ahead of their time, as one might say, and only with the passage of years do we see those ideas come to fruition. Henry GeoTge, as well as Cobden and Gladstone, in their respective periods, may have advocated principles that were then looked upon as too advanced; but free trade came to be accepted in England, and I hope that before long the same doctrine will conquer both in the United States and in Canada. It may be said that as yet free trade has not made much progress in Canada, not even in the ranks of the Liberal party. I admit that progress has been slow but a tree is of slow growth, even where the conditions are favourable, and the same may be said of free trade in this country. And then there is this also to be said. In the world of nature tornadoes and storms occur which often uproot trees from the soil. We had such a disturbance in the political life of this country in 1911, when an explosion of prejudice, for which the Conservative party were responsible, defeated the reciprocity agreement with the United States which the late Sir Wilfrid Laurier arranged after years of consideration and with the expectation of contributing greatly to the prosperity of the Canadian people. The defeat of the Reciprocity Act was a setback for the free trade idea. Reciprocity was worsted, with the result that ever since the people of Canada have been lamenting the fact. In the provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta the sentiment in favour [DOT]of reciprocity was very pronounced, and this policy, which embodied the principle of free trade, would undoubtedly have been a great boon to them, as well as to the rest of Canada had it gone into effect. In the West a period of stagnation followed. In the city of Edmonton, when I was there in 1914, arrangements were put into effect to give employment to those who were in need. Works such as paving streets and constructing sidewalks in the outskirts of the city were undertaken in advance of the time when they would actually be required in order to give employment to workingmen who would otherwise have been objects of charity. Then take the matter of exchange between the United States and Canada. The adoption of the reciprocity pact would have given our farmers, more particularly those
f Mr. Turgeon.]
in the West, a market for their [DOT]wheat and other cereals, as well as for their live stock, and when any additions to that live stock were needed they could have been obtained from the other side without any difficulty. The trade that would have resulted between the two nations as a result of the reciprocity agreement would have been such as to have afforded an equilibrium in the matter of exchange, and we should not have suffered the loss in that regard which has taken place during the last year.
It has been said that the Liberal party have done very little to promote the adoption of free trade. I do not say that the Liberal Government, under the guidance o( Sir Wilfrid Laurier promised when they came to office in 1896 to establish free trade as it is in England immediately, but their aim was in that direction. Almost at the very first session of Parliament after their return to office their steps were turned in that direction, and as my hon. friend (:Mr. McKenzie) so lucidly explained yesterday, a great measure of relief was put into operation in 1897 which effected a saving to the people of $100,000,000 every year, and which to-day, bearing in mind the growth of population which has since taken place, would have represented something like $200,000,000 of relief from taxes yearly, a relief that would have been experienced more particularly by the labouring classes and the farming community. During all the intervening years, prosperity, contentment and happiness prevailed in Canada. The late Sir Wilfrid Laurier was all the time contemplating measures having for their object to relieve the people of further burdens. Finally he conceived that the best possible thing would be the inauguration of reciprocity with United States, and the then Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) my esteemed friend from Shelburne and Queen's spent an entire year in discussions with the American authorities and ultimately effected an agreement which commanded the admiration of everybody who has had the opportunity of studying it and who was conversant with the natural conditions as between Canada and the United States.
Let me now for a moment or two consider some statements which have been published in the press of Canada, more particularly the Government press. The effort is being made to make all possible capital out of exaggerated reports of a so-called cleavage in policy between two sections of the Liberal party. Under scare heads some of the newspapers hold up to the public eye the so-called spectacle of a party divided into moderate protectionists and moderate free

traders. These journals allege that the speeches made in. Parliament and out oi it indicate that there has been a departure from the tariff plank as laid down in the Liberal platform, and that the ideal of free trade is being forsaken. The truth may seem funny to lips that have been tasting gall and wormwood, but these journals greatly deceive themselves. We still keep the ideal in our mind, but, as I have already explained, conditions are not always favourable for carrying an ideal into effect. So it is with the Liberal party. Actual circumstances make concessions imperative, and events are gradually leading up to a demonstration of the fact that in the last analysis 'free trade must solve the problems that confront us. It is my intention to support the amendment of the hon. member for Shelburne and Queen's (Mr.. Fielding), and I shall do so with pleasure. I see in it a sincere expression of a desire to alleviate the burdens which bear so heavily upon the shoulders of the poor consumers of this country. The amendment of the hon. gentleman proposes a step in the right direction and I shall therefore willingly support it. I need not read to this House the resolutions which were passed toy the Liberal party at its convention in August last, tout I think 1 can safely say that the amendment moved by the hon. member is in harmony with the proposals contained in those resolutions. I have no doubt whatever that the public will view the amendment as a wise one, and I know that when the Liberal party comes into power, whether it be in three months' or three years' time, one of their first considerations will toe the affording of some real relief for the poor people of this country.
I am sure, Mr. Speaker, that our friends in the Farmers' party cannot find any considerable difference between their platform and ours, for if I read their programme aright, it is contained in the policy of the Liberal party. But, whatever differences there may toe beltween us, we are at any rate, in accord in this, that we have a common desire to free the masses Of the people of Canada from the burden which has been imposed upon them [DOT] for so long by the protectionist policy that has been in vogue in this country; and I think it is also, our common desire that that relief shall soon be given to the people.
With regard to our home industries, I may say just a word or two. Some years ago when the National Policy was being launched by Sir John A. Macdonald, that statesman said that we should look after
native industry in its infancy. Well, the native industries of Canada are now forty-five years old. I think that the Conservative leader, Sir John A. Macdonald, intended that they should be propped up only so long as they were incapable of taking care of themselves, and I think that if he could return to earth now and see what progress Canada has made since he departed this life, if he could see some of our so-called infant industries, he would tell his friends on the other side that if these industries still need to be propped up, then they had better remove such cripples from the highway and let the chariots of prosperity and liberty pass on their way. The Conservatives or the Protectionists, Mr. Speaker, have changed the description which they have all along applied to their protege; it is now "home" industry, not "native" industry; they think that home industry appeals more to the imagination of the people. I think, Mr. Speaker, that it is a poor country that restricts its efforts in any direction, industrially, commercially or agriculturally, and looks only to the home market. I say that the manufacturers and all others engaged in business should not be satisfied with the home market alone; they must look to foreign markets which are now open to them but which they may lose to the more vigilant American producer or the more alert German .trader who is now preparing to take full advantage of all the markets which the world can offer. These highly efficient business men are invading the field while Canada is marking time and, if I may say so, execrating the term "free trade." I think, Sir, that the conditions which are prevailing at the present time are conducive to free trade. I may be in error, but I think that the people of this country, and indeed of all countries, have never been in a better position to adopt a free trade policy in the exchange of products than they are to-day. What are we called upon to do at the present moment? We hear on every hand that the increased production of foodstuffs is imperative for the safety of the world. As most of you probably know, Dr. J. W. Robertson has travelled extensively in Europe since the conclusion of the war. He .appeals to the people of Canada to produce .and to export in order to afford some relief to the present distressing conditions under which the people of many European countries are living. When I think of the lack of food, the lack of proper clothing, the lack of many of the essentials of life which the

people of these European countries are suffering, I feel that I should ask our farmers, in the West and elsewhere, to produce, to stay on the farm, to keep their sons and their daughters on the farm. I would have them free from taxes, municipal, provincial, federal, in order that we may be able to do our part in bringing about the salvation of suffering European countries. The condition there is almost as siad as it was when the world was in the midst of war, because millions of children are dying from the effects of starvation, an indirect result of the war. Therefore I say to every farmer and to every man of industry: take away all tariff from these implements of industry; take away all tariff or encumbrance upon what the farmer needs in his work of production. I do not ask that in the interests of the farmer alone; I want him to be able to produce, and the cheaper you make his production the more he will produce and the more of our products will go across the ocean.
It was with sadness that I listened the other night to my genial friend from St. John City (Mr. Elkin) in his reference to what the farmers had done and what cause they had for complaint. The farmer who gave his son whom he could spare from the farm and who kept another son at home in order that he might be able to assist in production of the necessities of life to maintain our soldier companions in the field did more than my hon. friend, with all the thousands of dollars which he may have given and which I am sure he did give- his sacrifice was not as great as that of the farmer who gave his son and himself remained on the farm to engage in the great work of production.
My hon. friend talked also of protection. He was a free trader, he said; now he is a .protectionist. Of course, I do not know his motives, but his conversion has been very rapid. Three years ago he was elected to this House as a Liberal joining the Liberal-Unionists as a sacrifice for the time being, as a matter of conscience. With his attitude on that occasion I do not quarrel. But he says he is a protectionist because Canada is not in a position to adopt free trade. He tells the farmers of his province to be satisfied with the conditions that he and the industrial people of his city or of other cities impose upon them. He would give them no say in the making of the future of Canada; he would have them come very modestly into the streets and market squares of St. John with their products and be satisfied with what the industrial people
give them. They should listen only to my hon. friend and hie fellow protectionists; hand over their products; and wait for the future. But, Sir, the farmers have been as generous as any other class of people, according to their means. To-day, I say, is the time more than ever when the industries of Canada can go in the direction of free trade, because their products are sought, as are the products of Canadian farms, in every part of the world. Every financier who looks into the matter dispassionately encourages the industries of Canada to produce and to take advantage of the market that offers for, their products, just as it offers for the products of the farm. Last April the directors of the Bank of Montreal announced an issue of $2,000,000 new capital stock to be offered to their shareholders of record as at the close of business on May 20, 1920, at 150 per share in the ratio of one in ten in order that the manufacturers of Canada might be able to take advantage of the trade that offers to them in the West Indies, British Guiana and West Africa. This bank with other important banks has announced the policy of forming close connection with permanent institutions firmly established rather than that of opening branches in foreign countries with all the resulting expense and difficulty. The banks are prepared to offer to the manufacturer further credit in order that they may take advantage of these markets which are offering to them.
A few days ago a lady who was the guest of the Ottawa Kiwanis Club at the Chateau Laurier, Miss Jill Crossley-Batt, told her hearers that Australia is in need of the products of Canada and is desirous of establishing trade communications in order to receive those products. She said also that Australia has products to offer to us which we greatly need, such as wool, leather, and raw materials in connection therewith, through the lack of which the people of Canada have had to pay excessive prices for clothing and shoes. It is urged by some that because we are a small country; because our population is only eight millions, we are not in a position to attend
9 p.m. to the demands of the foreign market. But if there is a country that is suited to the adoption of free trade at the present time it is Canada. We have immense resources. We can produce more pulp and paper than any other country in the world. We have vast water-powers awaiting only the hand of the engineer in order to produce every day millions of dollars' worth of articles which the Old World needs. We have many other kinds

have to be paid by the consumer; it has to be paid, as I have already said, by ninety-five per cent of the population of the country who are least able to support it. I repeat, every time you tax production you raise the selling price and increase the cost of living. It is not so with a tax on land. We therefore change a burden into a benefit to the people. By taxing land values the owner finds his land unused and he will sell it cheaper than under the present system. Under the present system those who use land in a productive manner are taxed more heavily and their improvements are taxed. The more they improve their property and extend their field of production the more they are taxed. But we are asking to tax land on the value given it by the community. The community would judge that a farm, or a piece of land on the outskirts of a city, was worth so much today. The tax would be imposed on that value, and whatever improvements were made would be free. It would encourage the owner to improve his property or, if he does not improve his property, to sell. That system would bring immigration, it would bring settlers to those immense tracts of vacant land which we have in the West and to many abandoned farms in the East, and to areas in the provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, which have been left' uncultivated. Under this system these farms would immediately become productive. It would bring in capital and create a demand for labour both of which are now debarred because of the excessive prices asked by speculators. Our farmers in the country and our homesteaders in the West have everything to gain by this tax on land values.
During the war the very thing which should have been taxed was not taxed and everything which was taxed should not have been taxed. To-day we have a heavier debt to pay and more annual interest. The income tax has also been delayed. 1 cannot hold my hon. friend the Minister of Finance responsible for that because he was not in the House or a member of the Government. But I remember an eloquent appeal made in favour of the income tax at a special session of the House, which only lasted about five days after the declaration of war, when the hon. member for Bed Deer rose and called upon the Government of Canada immediately to impose an income tax upon the people in order to form an asset against the expenditure on account of the war. We, on this side of the House, all joined him, but for two or three long sessions the then Minister of Finance (Sir
fMr. Turgeen.]
Thomas White) smiled away our efforts for the taxation of incomes. At last, late in the session of 1917, after having said at the beginning of the session the collection of the tax would not pay the expenses of collecting it, the income tax was adopted.
I demonstrated at the time that even amongst his colleagues in the Cabinet there were a sufficient number of millionaires to be able to guarantee the expense of the collection of the tax throughout Canada, and therefore he need not be uneasy as to the cost of making that collection. At last, in 1917, the Government acceded to our request. But it took us a long time to obtain the concession.
The Government may also set up the claim that they have adopted other measures calculated to promote the welfare of the country. They may say that in 1917 they gave free wheat also. But an election was anticipated shortly and such was the feeling that had been aroused among the people who were bemoaning and lamenting the defeat of the reciprocity pact, that some western ministers who had been paying a visit to the West got alarmed, and returned to Ottawa and said, "We must have free wheat." But free wheat, as well as the concession in regard to income tax of which I have spoken, are measures which wefe really due to the exertions of the Liberal party.
I wish again to urge the adoption of a policy of taxing land values. The inauguration of this system may take some time- perhaps that is to be expected in the case of every new system of taxation-but it is only a few days since we were informed by Mr. Breadner, the Commissioner of Taxation that even after three years the methods of collecting the income tax were not perfect, and that two or more years might yet elapse before the system was adjusted to a nicety, so that collections might be promptly made and at a great lessening of expense. The same perhaps would be true if a system of taxing land values were adopted. But, notwithstanding any difficulties which might have to be overcome at its inception, we would within a very few years derive a revenue from it of $100,000,000, and even $200,000,000, which would wipe out a considerable portion of the war debt, and compel future generations to admit that we had lifted 'from their shoulders some of the burdens imposed. May I not appeal to my generous friend, the new Minister of Finance, and ask him in the most amiable manner that I can, to take into consideration this question of taxing land

values, and see if he cannot give effect to it before this vote is taken, or at a later stage when we go into committee. It is doubtless unnecessary to inform the Minister of Finance-who follows these matters perhaps more closely than I do-as to what happened in England with respect to this policy. In the British Parliament, owing to a snap verdict the movement for the taxation of land values received a temporary set back, but this fact did not discourage Mr. Asquith. That right hon. gentleman expressed no despair over what had happened. It was, he said, not an occasion to write the epitaph "Requiescat," but rather "Resurgam"-"I shall rise again." And when that takes place a better day will dawn for the mass of workers in Great Britain. The temporary defeat of this policy is no doubt attributable to the peers of England who are great land owners and have taken the opportunity to rid themselves of this taxation and have the burden placed on the industries of Great Britain.
Last year a tariff inquiry was promised by the Minister of Finance, but no inquiry has yet taken place. To-day we again have the promise of such an inquiry. I have all belief in the sincerity of the present Minister of Finance and I hope his anticipation will be realized. But he will need to be on his guard against the manufacturers and the other protectionists who will come to him with a demand not for additional duties perhaps, but for "moderate protection" the idea of which was so eloquently set forth toy my genial and good-hearted friend the Minister of Marine (Mr. Ballan-tyne). The same idea of a "moderate" tariff was expounded in the West sometime ago by the Minister of the Interior (Mr. Meighen). "A moderate tariff," what a vague expression it is ! You might erect a Chinese wall around the confines of Canada and yet the protectionist would tell you it was "moderate" protection. The promise of "moderate protection" is not satisfactory, we want something more definite. People will tell you, "What we want is a scientific tariff," and this term is freely used in the public journals of Canada. We are not given any figures to show what a "scientific" tariff means; it is capable of almost any interpretation. I hope therefore that when the Minister of Finance comes to sit down at the table and deal with the so-called "scientific tariff" he will display the same courage that animated him in presenting his Budget which could not have been in conformity with his hopes or expectations. As a matter of fact science 169
is opposed to a tariff. Science in its operation works for the good of humanity and contributes to the welfare and comfort of the community. In this instance the community consists of ninety-five per cent of the community who toil for a living. They are the persons in whose behalf science should be invoked and the protectionist should be told plainly, "We will took after the mass of the people first." The tariff, Mr. Speaker, is only a creation of the convenience of the privileged classes, and I must protest against any further' impositions on the people.
(Now, I feel that I have taken up too much time and have encroached on your patience, Mr. Speaker, and the patience of the House. But I could not let this occasion pass without expressing my view of conditions as they are to-day. We are living under abnormal conditions; abnormal conditions prevail throughout the world; and it is for that very reason that we must courageously face the situation and adopt the best possible means at our disposal for restoring the happiness and prosperity of this country and helping, as far as lies within our power, to restore the happiness and prosperity of those countries in Europe which are appealing to Canada and to the United States for sustenance. Now, exclusive attention to home markets cannot possibly meet those conditions. We must have an expansion of trade if we are not only to develop our own resources but help those countries that are suffering as a result oi the war.
I have spoken at great length, Mr. Speaker, but what I have said has come from the heart. I have given utterance to what I hold to be truths and not mere pet ideas. I trust therefore that what I have said will have some weight with the Minister of Finance, and that that hon. gentleman will not regard my remarks as mere idle talk to keep this House occupied for the time being. I have expressed my convictions and I feel that I am right. I believe, Sir, that the truths I have stated will appeal not only to my own constituency but to all the people who do not believe in privilege.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I am not going to speak at any great length. Perhaps I have not as much to say as my hon. friend who has just sat down (Mr. Turgeon), and at all events I will try to express my views in very much shorter time. I should like to add my congratulations to those that have been already expressed to the Minister of Finance for the



very able Budget he has presented and the clear manner in which he has presented it. I do this, Sir, with a great deal of pleasure, because I can look back thirty years to a time when the present Finance Minister and myself were associated in another form of public service. I think it was his first position in the public service as a young man just entering his profession. He made good in that position, Sir, and it has been my pleasure to see him advance from one post to another, each more important than the last, until to-day he occupies one of the highest places in the Dominion of Canada. My thirty years of friendship and acquaintance with the minister therefore makes that fact a very gratifying one to me. The minister displayed in his speech the characteristics he has always exhibited since I have known him-caution in preparing his case and courage in presenting it. Evidently he learned a good while ago that old maxim: Be sure you are right, then go ahead; and the result i.s that in this Budget he has shown, as I think, a more courageous course than any Minister of Finance that we have had in the Dominion of Canada. Of course, he and the Government face to-day the most difficult conditions that any Government or any Finance Minister ever had to face in the history of Canada. There have been times in the past when a large amount of money had to be raised; but never has there been a time when such a tremendous volume of revenue was demanded, never was there a time when circumstances called for such large expenditures; never were we compelled to impose such drastic taxation, taxation so new and to which the people are so unaccustomed.
Taxation that, in my judgment, it required a great deal of courage for the Government to impose. The minister has told us the truth and the whole truth about our national assets, and I think he is to be commended on that score. He has resisted the temptation to make our balance sheet appear better than it is, and that is not always done by public men when they are trying to put the best face possible upon the case they are presenting to the country. I believe 'that the frankness displayed by the minister in that respect will be received with admiration by the people of Canada. I think that the people like their public men to be frank and straightforward. They can see through any camouflage that is put on just as easily as those who are behind the scenes; and any short experience in public life leads me to believe that if a man has a case which he

can defend the people are ready to listen to him. They are reasonable in meeting their obligations and will respond to courageous leadership. But to my mind, the confidence which the Minister of Finance displays in the Canadian people all through his speech is the best and truest note he 'has sounded, and I venture to predict iiha't the nation will respond and be prepared for any necessary sacrifice. He has added burdens of taxation as undreamt of in the past as they are imperative for the present and for the immediate future, and he has called for united effort to meet the obligations of to-day and reduce the liabilities of to-morrow. This should, and I believe it will, inspire our citizens to give him 'the support he needs to begin the process of restoring the finances of this country to their pre-war solidity.
As I see it, Mr. Speaker, the Budget shows high regard for the masses. It may bear somewhat heavily upon wealth, upon those large incomes, but in my judgment that is the right kind of Budget to bring down in any country, particularly in these times qf stress. What I was particularly interested in was his declaration that the Government will adhere to the principles of the National Policy. I am confident that that will appeal to the judgment of the great mass of the people of Canada. I desire especially to emphasize his pledge that the tariff shall not be used to exploit the consumer. I will not take the time, Mr. Speaker, to read all that he said on this subject; I shall simply quote a few words from page 2569 of unrevised Hansard. The Finance Minister said:
Apart from the question of revenue, the tariff should have regard to the maintenance, stability and prosperity of Canadian enterprise in the development of all our natural resources in lands, forests, mines, fisheries, as well as our agricultural and manufacturing industries.
That, as I understand, is the principle of the National Policy. He goes on to say:
Consideration must also he given to the importance of creating and maintaining conditions that will afford to Canadian industrial workers opportunities for steady and remunerative employment. It is undoubtedly in the true interests of Canada as a whole that Canadian workers should not be forced to seek in foreign countries employment and opportunity denied them at home by reason of the export of the natural resources, primary products, and raw materials with which the Dominion is amply endowed.
Mr. Speaker, I am satisfied that seventy-five per cent of the people of Canada are in favour of the protection of our industries. An intensive propaganda has been carried on for years to convince them that the

manufacturers systematically exploit them to accumulate huge fortunes. In a few instances huge fortunes may have been piled up as the result of-taking advantage of the tariff. But I venture to say that that ha's happened only in isolated cases; that the men who work in factories as well as those who manage these enterprises have equally been beneficiaries of the protection that has been given to our industries.
Mr. Speaker I am a protectionist by conviction. I am not like some men in public life; I did not inherit my politics. My father was an intimate personal friend of and sympathizer with the grandfather of the leader of the Opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King), the late William Lyon Mackenzie.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Hear, hear.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: He was a Baldwin reformer, and he instructed me in the doctrines of Liberalism of that day and until I grew up to be a young man. He was not satisfied to call himself a reformer; he was a Clear Grit, a follower of Brown and Mackenzie. You will readily understand, Mr. Speaker, that growing up beside a man holding such political views, I was somewhat thoroughly instructed.


Mr. PROULX:: And the son went astray.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Well, I am just coming to that. I grew to manhood cherishing a very high regard for Brown, Mackenzie, Blake and Mowat. But about the time I was called upon to cast my first ballot in a Federal election the late Sir John A. .Macdonald introduced the National Policy and affirmed the principle of the protection of our industries. I had grown up, Sir with conditions surrounding me that upset all .my preconceived theories about the tariff. As a boy and a young man I saw my schoolmates, as they grew to manhood and learned their trade or profession, forced to go across to the United States to get employment. I saw the largest furniture factory in Canada at that time, located in Toronto, forced to close its doors and throw two thousand men out of employment. I saw trade sales of American-made furniture put on every week in Toronto the effect of which was to drive out the furniture factories we had in that city and close down one of our great industries. There were more Canadians in Chicago then than there were in Toronto or in Montreal. The very .best blood of Canada, our young enterprising men, unable to find opportunities in out own country, were obliged to go * across the border in order to earn their livelihood. I sav. Mr. Speaker, 169J
that any young man of observant mind growing up in those days could not help being impressed with such a spectacle as that which I am trying to describe. So, when I was called upon to cast my first vote in a federal election I decided that nothing could be worse than what we had and that I was willing to give the new policy a trial. I voted for the National Policy, and I have voted for the party that supported the National Policy and protection ever since because my (subsequent observation and experience confirmed me in the belief that protection of our industries is absolutely necessary for the further development of Canada. I suppose I am like one of those whom the member for West Kent (Mr. McCoig) spoke of this afternoon. He complained that the member for Parkdale (Mr. Mowat) had a short time ago advocated free trade and reciprocity. Well, I never was quite guilty of that, but I was wondering while the member for West Kent was referring to the member for Parkdale why he did not couple the name of that hon. gentleman with that of the hon. member for Shelburne and Queen's (Mr. Fielding), who has changed his views in regard to the tariff quite as much and in quite as striking a way as has the member for Parkdale.
Now, the tariff is necessary for our urban communities;-I think many free traders will acknowledge that-and it is equally necessary for Tural communities, for the farmers and their sons and daughters. If this country is ever to be great it can only be by the establishment of diversified industries. If a farmer in Ontario has six sons, only one will stay on the farm; the others - will want to go elsewhere, to be doctors, lawyers, mechanics or business men. If we have not large urban communities such as are developed and maintained by large industries, there are no opportunities for men who want to leave the farm and en-'ce in other professions; and that is one of the primary reasons why the farmers of Ontario are protectionists. They have always voted for a protectionist policy, and my judgment is that they are as soundly convinced as they ever have been that that is the best policy for Canada. It has brought hundreds of millions of dollars of American capital into this country; it has kept hundreds of thousands of Canadians at home. We need our young men, Mr. Speaker, to develop our national life. We want our young men and our young women to build up their homes in this country and to give their work and their service to the building up of the nation.

There are some things which have not been done in Canada in which, I think, we might have made greater advances. In passing, I should like to say that we are not proceeding fast enough with thS development of our fuel resources. The time is coming, and indeed is not far distant, when the question will be, not how much we have to pay for coal, but whether we can get coal at all, and the primary duty of the Government is to develop not only our coal resources but our peat resources and any other fuel resources we have, and to establish such means of transportation as will make it possible for us to bring coal from the extremes of the country into the central provinces. I might talk at length upon that subject, but I want to keep my promise to you, Sir, that I would not be long, and I have something else to say.
I appreciate very much, as I think the people of Canada will, the desire of the Government to economize in every possible way. I have not yet seen many signs of economy. One action has been taken which effects a considerable saving, and my suggestion is that it should be carried out to a much larger degree than it has been already. I listened with great interest to the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir George Foster), when he spoke of the Civil Service of this country. He said that it was necessary that the expenditure on that service should be lessened. He told us that there were forty or fifty thousand men and women in the service; that it was a great organization through which the Government carried out its enterprises and its administration, and that millions 'of dollars could be wasted and spent uselessly through an inefficient Civil Service throughout the country, which millions could equally well be saved through efficient organization and thorough co-operation amongst the members of the Civil Service. I am not sure that that declaration by the Minister of Trade and Commerce received the attention that it deserves, and I am going to propose to him, to the Prime Minister, and to the Government, a way by which they can effect a saving of $20,000,000 a year.
My first suggestion would be that the Government declare a holiday of one year in the making of new appointments to the public service of this Dominion. If there are positions to fill, let the Government promote some of the superfluous members of the service in the various departments and place them where it is supposed that new officials are required. In that way, I be-

lieve <with 'the exception of the few experts that might f>e required) the Dominion service could run for a year without one additional appointment. This is what has been done in one department. At long last, as some hon. member said, we got a Secretary of State who had the courage to go into the Printing Bureau, the condition of which branch of the service had been a disgrace for years. There was not a printer in Canada who did not know how grossly that department was overloaded; that hundreds of thousands of dollars were being wasted every year. And yet it seemed to be impossible to find a man who would assume the position of minister of that department and clean it up as it ought to be cleaned up. This House knows that it has been decided to cut off three or four hundred men, and three hundred men have already been cut off from the Printing Bureau. At the present rate of wages in the allied printing trades, I would estimate that that would mean a saving of between $500,000 and $600,000 a year. With three hundred men cut off and $500,000 saved a year, as much work is being got out of that department to-day as was got out of it when there were thre hundred more men on the staff. And the same thing can be done in practically every other department of the Government of Canada. But courage is required for measures of that kind, and I am going to credit every minister of the Government with having courage to do ftiis, and say to him: You can save $20,000,000 if you will collectively go through every department of Government in Canada as the former Secretary of State went through the Printing Bureau, and I believe that by transferring unnecessary officials in one department to necessary positions in another department, we can get along for a year without making aiiy new appointments, except such technical and expert officials as may be required. That is the way to get efficiency. Make it possible for industrious men and women to work for promotion. Why is it that in the Printing Bureau a staff of men and women, three hundred less than it was a month or so ago, is turning out as much work as before? It is because those who remain know that they must work in order to hold their jobs. Let that idea go all through the service of Canada, and two men would do the work that three men are doing now. But some person must take the matter in hand and do it with a spirit of courage that is not always manifested in the administration of departments. It is not necessary that I should state to the House that the service of Canada is over-

loaded. There is not a member of Parliament, nor a person working in the Civil Service, nor a minister of the Crown, who does not know that. I say: Take the overload and distribute it around; instead.of making new appointments, promote those who are now in the service, and if they are not fully qualified, give them an opportunity to qualify so that they can go up from one position to another. Form a board of deputy ministers for the promotion of efficiency in the Civil Service, and let them collaborate in regard to every position that falls vacant or every appointment that is to be made, instead of, as at present, if an official is superannuated or dies, putting a new man in his place although there may be in the department a dozen or fifty persons more than are necessary to carry on the work. A good deal more would have been accomplished if instead of the cumbersome system that has been adopted, some kind of instruction had been provided for those who are now in the service, so that a man or a woman could qualify for the position higher up, thus, having always ready those who could take their promotion for any positions that became vacant. Tf yon could inspire the deputy ministers and the assistant deputy ministers with the idea that they were going to make the public service of Canada the most efficient public service in the world, there would be competition from the bottom to the top and from the top down to the bottom amongst those who are now in the service in order that they might render better service, earn a better reward and get a better position. What inducement is there now for a man or u woman who is in the service to show extraordinary ability ot industry''- There is no inducement whatever; too many of them simply put in their time, and many of them who do that could be turned into good officials if some incentive were put before them to inspire them to give better service.
There is another feature of this case that deserves attention. Why not readjust the hours of the officials of this Government? Why not require them to work eight instead of six and a half hours a day? Why not add 20 per cent to the working time and reduce the staff 20 per cent? Manifestly, if you increase the time that is put in by the employees in the public service in Ottawa by 20 per cent, you can do with 20 per cent fewer employees. There should be no objection to any person who works for this Government putting in eight hours a day. Why should not a clerk or a messenger work ei ht hours as well as a bricklayer, printer, moulder or any other man?
That is one v;ay in which practically 20 per cent more of service could be given to this country by these employees, and a saving of 20 per cent on about $75,000,000 or $80,000,000 would be an enormous sum left in the treasury of this country. It would mean both better officials for the service and a great many more million dollars to the country.
But this is a task that calls for the best brains you have in the administration. It calls for the best brains you have in the service, for men who have been long in the service, who understand its needs, and who would enter into the idea sympathetically and apply themselves to give their very best to working ou't this plan for the benefit of the people of Canada. I do not think it is a task for a group of glib-tongued young theorists who come into a country they have never lived in, of whose system of Government they are entirely ignorant, and who bring in some theories that may be applicable elsewhere and, in effect, put those theories over and above the experience of deputy ministers and chief officials who have been in the service of thia country for thirty or forty years. If you had such a plan as that in operation, you would not have a spectacle such as that which was presented in the Senate a few days ago, when a debate took [DOT] place on the appointment or dismissal of a translator who had been appointed by the present Commission and who was found after two and a half months to be absolutely unable to translate two or three pages of the debates in the Senate. He received higher marks in the written examination than anybody else, but when put down 'to do the job he could not translate two or three pages olf Hansard properly in two and a half months. That is the kind of thing you are getting now, and it is not making for efficiency in the service. I think the present plan takes the heart out of responsible deputy ministers. My idea would be to inspire them to give their very best to this country, to go through their departments, and to go through them collectively and discuss with each other: Where is a man to fill this position and that position? It would also put heart in the officials in minor positions, who, I am sure, with the hope of promotion, would be willing not only to work eight hours a day, but to work harder and more efficiently while they are working. The Government is calling on the people of Canada to practice economy, "Produce and Save" is the watchword. Well, I submit that here is a plan that will effect econo-

my, and I submit it with all due deference. I am not submitting it with any complaint against the Government; I know the extraordinary labours the ministers have had to perform during the years of the war, and in fact up to the present time; they have been worked to death. I am not complaining, but I am afraid they have not thought of this plan, and I have thought of it; so I am just putting it before them for their consideration, and am wondering whether they will themselves do through the Government and through this House what they are calling on the people of Canada to do, namely, to practise the closest economy in our expenditures.
There is reason to congratulate the Government upon its Budget. It shows great courage to impose these new taxes. I think those taxes are going to bring in more than enough money to meet all the expenditures of this country during this fiscal year, and I think there will be a substantial sum besides to apply in reducing the debt. It is not an easy thing to impose new taxes, but I want the Government to go a little further now that they have imposed them. Let them get to work and, after the most careful thought, devise a plan somewhat on the lines I have suggested for reducing the service by 20 per cent and saving $20,000,000 additional to apply to the reduction of the public debt.


Mr. J. FRED JOHNSTON (Last Mountain) :: Mr. Speaker, I wish to refer to one remark which was made by the hon. member who has just taken' his seat (Mr. Hoek-en), in respect to emigration from this country previous to the adoption by the Government of Canada of the National Policy. I was a boy some years, I expect, after the hon. gentleman was, and -for many years after the old National Policy had been given what I would consider a fair trial in this country, and I would point out to him that there was great emigration from this country even in those days. Many of our young people were leaving the farms of Canada and going to the United States. Right at the present time people are leaving the farms in the province of Ontario in hundreds. You have fewer farmers on the land in Ontario to-day by many thousands than you had ten years ago. Now, if protection as we had it under the old National Policy was such a good thing for the farmers of this province, it seems to me that instead of having fewer farmers we would have more farmers on the land.


Mr. LALOR:: iMay I ask a question?


John Frederick Johnston: 
Mr. H. A. MACKIE:: Does the hon. gentleman pretend to speak for the province of Saskatchewan?


An hon. MEMBER:: Sure.


John Frederick Johnston: Very different was the [DOT]action of the minister's predecessor who, though convinced of the justice of our claim, made promises which he did not live up to. If I have erred in taking upon myself something that I should not have done, I must say that I am only following in the footsteps of the hon. gentleman (Mr. H. A. Mackie) who undertakes to speak not only for the province of AlbeTta but for the whole Dominion of Canada when he gets a chance.
Now I wish to pay some attention to the speech of the hon. member for St. John city (Mr. Elkin). That hon. member came to this House as a Liberal and an avowed free trader. When, in the discussions around the corridors, the question came up as to who among the Liberals would stick to the Government forces, the hon. member for St. John city was one who was always counted out because, as I have said, he came to this House as an avowed free
26G6

trader. What then was the surprise of hon. members on this side-in fact 1 think of hon. members on both sides-when the hon. member rose in his place a few evenings [DOT]'go and delivered one of the strongest protectionist speeches I have heard here.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: Honest conviction.


John Frederick Johnston: There is always a reason for such a quick conversion, and looking for the reason in the case of the hon. member for St. John one is reminded, Sir, that in private life he is a manufacturer and that his manufacturing business is one that is listed to be included in the great merger that is now in the process of consummation in this country. We have often heard, Sir, that the monied men of Canada-and, I think, of every other country-carry their politics in their pocket. Would it be that there was a money consideration in connection with this quick change of heart as exemplified by the hon. member for St. John? We have proof that men in the financial life of this country do change their politics in a hurry when they think there is a chance of their pocket being touched. I point you to the ex-Minister of Finance (Sir Thomas White) who with a number of other wealthy men of the city of Toronto-many of them reputed to be millionaires-repudiated their old party and its policy in 1911 because they, in their short-sightedness, feared to pit their ability against that of the Yankees in a fair, open, and above-board business transaction. No matter what the cause we have in the hon. member for St. John a living example of one who, in the twinkling of an eye, has been transformed from an avowed free trader into an ardent protectionist. One might understand how a moderate protectionist could extend, or stretch his moderate views so that he would get into the class that might be termed protectionist for protection's sake, or stand for the principle of protection, but how a man can go to bed at night an avowed free trader and wake up in the morning a real high protectionist is beyond my limited powers of comprehension.


An hon. MEMBER:: You did it for fifteen years.


John Frederick Johnston: As I said the hon. member for St. John was an avowed free trader because he used these words in his address to the House the other evening:
I believed in tree trade once myself.
Those were the hon. gentleman's words. It would be interesting for the House to

know just when the hon. member experienced his change of heart. He says he was once a free trader but does not enlighten the House as to when he was converted. Is it not a fact that the hon. member, as I have already said, has been engaged in manufacturing for a considerable time and that when so engaged he was a free trader? But now that his business is being absorbed in the gigantic merger to which I have alluded his fear of American competition is such that he has changed from a free trader to a protectionist. When the hon. member for Springfield (Mr. Richardson) a few days ago moved the adjournment of the House so that we might consider this merger many felt that something should be done by way of investigating the reasons for that combination and its effect, if consummated, upon the commercial life of this country. I think there is something in connection with this matter that would stand a thorough investigation. You will notice that the hon. member said the western free trader does not exist to-day, but he drew attention in those words to the demands of the western grain growers:
The western grain growers who want to make immediate and sweeping reductions in the tariff are fond of picturing Canadian manufacturers as a small group of selfish men, who support the tariff policy solely in their own interests. These grain growers ask: why should this privileged class be permitted to levy toll on all other classes in this country?
Yes, Mr. Speaker, the grain growers do picture the supporters of high protection as ,a selfish class. It has been proved times without number that the Canadian manufacturer can and does compete in the foreign market, where he has no protection against the products from other countries. Why then are the Canadian people penalized when our manufacturers can compete outside of Canada without protection? Is it not a reasonable question to ask, and logical to claim that they can compete in Canada? The grain growers not only claim that the manufacturers are selfish in asking for protection that they do not need, but they also claim that the manufacturers are standing in the way of the advancement and development of the agricultural resources of this country. Again I would remind the House of the resolution adopted by the Conservatives at the Toronto meeting in which they said that no handicap of any kind should be allowed to impede the progress of our farmers. Is there an honourable member in this House who will argue that you are not retarding the progress and development of

agriculture in this country by imposing a tariff on the importation of agricultural machinery and thereby enabling the Canadian manufacturers to exact the amount of that duty from the farmers? Is this not a restriction on production? Any one who has given the matter of Canadian finances any serious thought must realize that the one big thing needed in Canada to-day is increased production so that the heavy taxes .incurred through our war effort will not bear jtoo heavily on the producer. If this Government would adopt the resolution as passed by the Conservatives at Toronto their first consideration should be to remove all duties on agricultural implements and machinery necessary to production. The honourable member for St. John then gives to the House his unsupported word that the protective tariff not only benefits the manufacturer but almost every-other class in the country and then goes on to enumerate a long list. In this connection let me say that I am quite willing to leave this matter in the hands of the residents of the urban centres for them to decide upon at the next general election. Regarding taxes and the farmers the hon. member has this to say:
It should be the aim of Parliament to remedy every legitimate grievance, giving attention first to those that are most pressing. If the case of the farmers is to be given priority, then let the farmers show some cause more convincing than the loudness of the howl they are putting up. What taxes do they pay to swell the federal revenues other than those levied by means of the tariff? When other people are paying taxes under the tariff, and income and profit taxes besides, how do the farmers Justify their demand that they be relieved of taxes altogether? If their grievance is a real one, how do they account for the fact that there is such a brisk demand for western farm land, with advancing prices? If there were a movement away from the land there would be some colour to their argument.
Mr. Speaker, this is the first intimation that I have ever had that the farmers of this country were trying to evade paying their taxes. The farmer pays the general taxation of this country the same as every other person, and he pays the income when his income comes within the taxable amount. It is true that he has not been taxed for excessive profits because he never gets into that class. Regarding the other matter o>f a brisk demand for western farm lands, and a movement towards the land, I admit that there is a great cry of " Back to the land," but I fail to see any evidence of the urban dwellers of this country making any move towards the land. Any farm lands that are being taken up in Western Canada to-day are being taken principally by Americans
from across the line, or by farmers in that country enlarging their holdings. In this connection I would like to say that in the province of Saskatchewan, from which 1 come, there are fewer actual farmers on the land to-day than there have been homesteads entered for.
As a fitting climax to the other mis-statements of the hon. member for St. John he winds up in this fashion: in respect to the representation in this Parliament:
If the farmer persists in an attempt to get from under altogether, and leave the whole load to be carried by the townsman, it is not unlikely that the latter will arise in his might and sweep aside the pernicious principle whereby he has been deprived of his just representation and voting power.
The hon. gentlemen proceeds to give some comparative tables in respect to this matter, which tables I shall not quote. If the farmer dominates in this Parliament, Mr. Speaker, it is not by force of numbers. It is a well-known fact that according to the last census taken in this country 54.5 of our population were found to be rural, and the farmers in this Parliament represent much less than twenty per cent of the total membership. I think, therefore, that this statement of the hon. member for St. John is on a par with many other statements he has made. The hon. gentleman makes the threat that if the farmers continue to raise what he is pleased to term " a howl," the urban dwellers may rise in their might and demand that they be give:, representation in this Parliament in strict accordance with population. I do not think that any farmer in this Parliament has ever suggested that the farmers should be represented in this House other than by population. If some of the rural ridings do not contain as many electors as some of the urban constituencies, I believe that the reason is that in re-distributing the country some consideration was given to area.. But if my hon. friend and those new-found friends of his see fit to make a re-distribution of the country and adhere strictly to population they will hear no complaints from the farmers.
Again, we as western farmers are charged with wishing to market our grain in Minneapolis and Chicago, and to buy our machinery from the United States. The only reason for this is that the western farmer wants to market his grain in Minneapolis and Chicago at times when it will bring him more money. There is no matter of sentiment in connection with the question at all. And the same applies to the purchasing of machinery. If any man needs a

piece of machinery and he can buy it for less money in the United States he naturally buys it there, and I think that a large portion of the machinery used in the factories of this country by people who support a protective tariff will be found to have been purchased in the United States. Yet no one would think of claiming that the owners of the factories are less Canadian because they use American machinery. There are those people in this country, Mr. Speaker, who consider that in buying American made machinery they are really doing a service to Canada, for the amount of the tariff levied on the machinery they get goes directly into the public treasury and not into the pockets of the manufacturers.
I come now to the last of the statements made by the hon. member for St. John, and this is in respect to our railways. He says:
These railways were trailt with the money of the people of Canada in order that there might he opened up for settlement a territory whose population are now enjoying marked prosperity. Without the railways there would have been no West. Without the taxes cheerfully paid year after year by Canadians in the East there would have been no railways. Is the partnership arrangement that has proven so mutually profitable now to be terminated simply because of the unwillingness of the West to pay its share of the operating expenses?
Did you ever hear a more ridiculous statement made in this House, that the farmers, residents of this country, taxpayers in this country, with everything they own subject to the advancement and development of this country, were out to cripple the great transportation system that we as a people now own and are operating? No argument can be adduced to combat a statement of this kind for it is .foundationless and absurd. In respect to this railway problem, let me say, the people of Western Canada are prepared to pay their full share of the deficit on these roads, but they are not willing that the whole deficit should be borne by those who use the roads, and they will not submit to an increase of freight rates for this purpose. I hold, Mr. Speaker, that this Parliament as representative of all parts of this Dominion and all the people of this Dominion, is responsible for the sad muddle in connection with our railways and we Western Canadians hold that it is not just or fair that those who happen to use these lines should be penalized for the mistakes of this Parliament as representative of all the people. I am forced to think, Mr. Speaker, that the hon. member could not have heard the hon.

Minister of Immigration and Colonization (Mr. Calder) when he gave these words to the House last session. They will be found at page 69, Vol. 1:
As a western representative, and particularly as a representative of the province of Saskatchewan, I feel I should say one word more. I refer to the conditions existing in Western Canada, where all the elements of disunion exists- A pretty big and serious problem. I am referring now to the tariff cleavage between East and West. You know, we might as well look that squarely in the face and recognize the situation as it exists; there is no use dodging it, that situation is there. What are the people of Canada going to do? Can it be settled in some way or another? Is there a possibility of a settlement? There is no doubt as to the feeling out West. There is no division among the people. All parties are practically united. What is to be done? You will have an opportunity later in the session to consider the question. In the meantime, I simply wish to point out to this House, and to the people of this country, that that is one of the other questions on the horizon that in many ways looks dangerous ; at any rate it divides the people of this country and puts them in two hostile camps, fighting against each other all the time. If Canada is to be what we hope it shall be, then an honest and earnest attempt must be made to solve that problem which stares us squarely in the face.
These were serious words coming from one who should know conditions in Western Canada, and yet we have an hon. member going out of his way, I am convinced, Mr. Speaker, at the request of some western politician, to make statements in this House that can serve no good purpose but will have, if taken seriously, a disrupting effect. I have taken considerable time in dealing with the remarks of the hon. member for St. John, and I now wish to say to him and to the House that the people of Western Canada are just as loyal to Canada, her institutions and the grand Empire of which we form a part, as the hon. member from St-. John, or any of those new friends whom he has so lately adopted.
Last year, Mr. Speaker, most of us who are now on these cross benches were called upon to make a decision in respect to the proposals of the Government in its Budget. The proposals did not suit some of us, and the promise of the ex-Minister of Finance for a revision of the tariff was not taken seriously. We had little hope, even with a commission appointed, that the tariff would be revised downward to such an extent that our views would be met. We voted against the Government on that occasion, and I think that in view of the result as we have it before the House to-day, our judgment was sound. My own reasoning was that there was no chance of the ex-Minister of Fin-

ance (Sir Thomas White) agreeing to a reduction that would suit me, and even if he did, I had little hope of its getting by a party caucus when the great majority of those present would be opposed. That was my opinion and in consequence, I have since been a cross-bencher in this House.
I would like to state my position in respect to the policy that we cross-benchers have adopted. It has been the aim of many hon. members of this House to make it appear that this movement is simply a class movement. Many of them have taken occasion to look over the policy as laid down by the Canadian Council of Agriculture and have tried to make the people believe that this policy is purely of a class nature. I may say that in 1916, shortly after this policy had been adopted by the Canadian Council of Agriculture, every candidate in the federal field in Saskatchewan was circularized by the secretary of the Grain Growers' Association there and asked whether if elected, he would be prepared to support the policy as laid down by the Canadian Council of Agriculture. My reply was in the affirmative, and prior to the consummation of Union Government in the fall of 1917 I issued a manifesto to the electors of Last Mountain in which I stated that I was a supporter of that policy in respect of tariff matters. I stated my position in this House in the Budget debate of last session. In view of these facts and the stand I had taken ever since I first became interested in public affairs, I could do nothing less than vote against the Government proposals as contained in last year's Budget. There are those who took a different view. It is for them to say whether the Government has fulfilled its pledges and whether the proposals of the Government as contained in this year's Budget are in the interests of Western Canada.
I am not going to make any appeals to the Government, Mr. Speaker; I believe it would avail me very little to do so. But I wish to point out to them that to have a solid, a lasting prosperity in this country, it must be founded upon the accomplishments and life of the agriculturist. Make prosperous the condition and happy the home life of the farmers in this country and all else will be well. There need be no worry about paying our national debt. Canada has the resources; her people have the conquering spirit. Change the fiscal policy so that no handicap shall be placed upon the real producers of wealth in this .country. But to do that, Mr. Speaker, to
bring about that change, we must, in my opinion, have a change of government.
There are many other matters to which reference might be made, but the hour is late and I do not wish to tire hon. gentlemen. I may say here that in respect to the matter of an early election I voted for the resolution of the hon. leader of the Opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King) at the beginning of this session, and I did so believing that I was carrying out the wishes of my constituents. I believe that the great majority of the electors of this country have lost confidence in the Government. It matters not whether it is a good government or a bad government, the people who are rseponsible for the election of members to this House are dissatisfied, and I believe that they have every reason to be dissatisfied. This Government was elected for a specific purpose and for a definite period. The purpose was to win the war; the period was for the length of time that it would take to accomplish that purpose. That has all been accomplished, and the people -are demanding that there should be an appeal to them. There are other reasons. This Government came into being as a Union Government. The promise was made to the people and to the Liberals who joined with the Conservatives under a Conservative leader that there should be a fifty-fifty split as respects the personnel of the Cabinet. That pledge or promise has never been fulfilled; and to-day we have a Government dominated by high protectionists. For this reason, I believe it is up to this Government to conclude the business of this session and then to appeal to the country for a new mandate.
On motion of Mr. M. Clark (Red Deer) the debate was adjourned.



PRIVATE BILLS.


[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 72, to incorporate The NorthWest Route, Limited.-Mr. Boys.
Bill No. 118 from the Senate, for the relief of James Lewis Price.-Mr. MacNutt.
Bill No. 119 from the Senate, for the relief of Frederick Tristram Clarke.-Mr. Burnham.
Bill No. 113 from the Senate, for the relief of Jessie Elizabeth Hudgin.-Mr. Mow-at.
Bill No. 115 from the Senate, for the relief of Caroline Ewing Gudewill.-Mr. Fripp.
[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 117 from the Senate, for the relief of Charles Lindsay Keys.-Mr. Cassel-man.
Bill No. 125 from the Senate, for the relief of Irene Martin	Chapman.-Mr. Hoeken.
Bill No. 52, to incorporate The Western Canadian Union Corporation on Seventh-Day Adventists.-Mr. Mackie (Edmonton).
Bill No. 105 from the Senate, to incorporate United Canada Fire Insurance Company.-Mr. Blake.

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 128 from the Senate, for the relief of Francis Charles Dean.-Mr. Mowat.
Bill No. 129 from the Senate, for the relief of John James Garrison.-Mr. Mowat.
Bill No. 130 from the Senate, for the relief of Dora Lumsden MacLaurin.-Mr. Fripp.
Bill No. 132 from the Senate, respecting The Army and Navy Veterans in Canada.- Mr. Blake.
Bill No. 133 from the Senate, for the relief of Edith Sarah Bell.-Mr. Douglas (Strathcona).
On motion of Rt. Hon. Mr. Doherty the House adjourned at 11.10 p.m.
Tuesday, May 25, 1920.